


it will not obey you

by rhythmantics



Category: The Secret Saturdays
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, check ends of chapters for specific warnings, uhhh some ocs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-22
Updated: 2018-02-26
Packaged: 2018-06-03 18:11:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 67,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6620998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhythmantics/pseuds/rhythmantics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"Against the standing place of the gods it has directed its terror,</i>
  <br/>
  <i>In the sitting place of the Anunnaki it has led forth fearfulness,</i>
  <br/>
  <i>Its dreadful fear it has hurled upon the land,</i>
  <br/>
  <i>Kur, its dreadful rays of fire it has directed against all the lands."</i>
</p><p>An extension fic, taking place two years after the end of the series. Canon compliant. Ignores TGIS. No shipping. Major spoilers for the main series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 7 lines damaged

**Author's Note:**

> See end of chapter notes for specific warnings. See the end of work note for footnotes.

How are you supposed to treat the day you were resuscitated from the dead?

Do you start to celebrate it like it’s a second birthday? Or do you just smile oddly at the calendar whenever it rolls around, knowing that every new second that passes is a second that you weren’t supposed to live? That each minute is a minute you weren't meant to exist? Even though the grand schemes of destiny, fate, or random happenstance were usually filed under "topics your parents like to have 'civil discussions' about," it's hard not to wonder, when it's late at night, and it's quiet, and all you can hear is the air in your lungs and the heartbeat in your ears. Dying, and then living again, it's an odd truth to bear. Every moment thereafter feels significant. You've always been significant.

Two years of terror. Two years of supervillains, mercenaries, fight-for-your-life; two years of uncertainty, fate-of-the-world, rests-in-your-hands.

Eleven to thirteen, that's the time it spanned. But it had started long before that, hadn't it? Before you were even born. Settled around your shoulders was a destiny that came creeping up from millennia past, one that you'd never asked to bear.

Maybe it was too much to ask for it to be over. Too selfish, or too greedy.

But you couldn't help the hope.

”ARGOST LIVES,” reads the graffiti that adorns the cities you fly over, but there’s an Argost-shaped hole in the world now, you know. Maybe you hadn’t been alive to witness it, but for a moment you felt it in your bones – foolish, foolish yeti, blindly ambitious, engineer of his own destruction. _You_ know, and you will always know, even if the world doesn’t.

The cleanup had been messy, because messes like these can never really be wrapped up with a pretty little bow like they can on TV, as you’ve learned. Even with Epsilon and his full, trice-notarized apology, the backing of his entire society, the world was still trembling in the aftershocks. Calls came pouring in, kept all of you busy for weeks. Months. All the hostility that may have built up between you and the other Secret Scientists evaporated in the face of the paperwork, fieldwork, work work work. And then…

It really had looked like it was over. It really had.

”Animals reacting to climate change.” That was the story they were going with. Most people hadn’t even been directly affected that day, brief a war as it had been. Sightings? Hoaxes. Videos? CG, maybe some sort of strange viral promotion. Within months, it was like nothing had happened at all. Business as usual, Weird World re-runs at nine-eight Central, calls on the hotline that you went out to investigate, nights spent relaxing on the new furniture in your house, its beams coming together as it was slowly re-built.

Exactly the same, except it wasn't at all.

You’d thought they were part of your growing pains, at first. You were fourteen, going through your first set of growth spurts, finally catching up to Wadi, who'd started hers a few months earlier. Sometimes your joints and bones just ached when you woke up. Wasn’t it only reasonable to expect something small like headaches, too?

Except they hadn’t been “something small.” Six months ago? Maybe seven? A dull throb at the front of your brain that grew into a shrieking, clawing monstrosity. And then it disappeared as suddenly as it came on. These phantom migraines, when you were rushed into the med-bay fast enough, had no apparent cause. They were head-scratchers, all right. They were an enigma, a puzzle without a solution.

A _mystery._

And your parents were in the business of mysteries. So, like any good scientists, they set to work trying to solve it.

Was your spinal alignment out of place? No, the x-rays said, that wasn’t right. So they tried another avenue. Imbalance of neurotransmitters, maybe? That wasn’t right, either - all your tests, MRIs, they came back normal. Latent trauma? PTSD? But the symptoms didn’t match. On and on, _ad nauseum_ (and you _were_ nauseous, now, half the time, a constant vertigo).

It kept your parents thinking. If not those, then what? A curse? A hex? Mom couldn’t discount the possibility, even if dad had been adamant that somehow, some way, the anomaly would show up if only they could figure out where the origin was. If only they could figure out what had gone wrong.

Maybe you WERE supposed to die. Not in any suicidal sense, but sometimes you would wonder, when the dull ache grew too intense for you to open your eyes, when you found your limbs so sapped of energy that you could barely even stand up unaided, if maybe some force like destiny existed. And then, you'd go on, if it did – that maybe you being alive had made it _angry_ , and now it was throwing a hissy fit because all its neat little plans had been messed up by your family’s intervention.

Fisk and Komodo became constants at your side. Some days were better than others, of course – some you could run and jump and whoop and laugh like there was nothing wrong – but that also meant that some days were worse, days where you were practically bedridden, days where you would be functioning just fine until a migraine just _hit_ and you crumpled to your knees, on the verge of emptying your breakfast onto whatever you were standing on. And it was getting _worse._

It was too dangerous for you to be out in the field, your parents deemed, even if that didn’t stop you. Because you knew, somewhere in your bones, that there was something out there for you, and you were hungry, _starved_ for it.

Why couldn’t things have turned out alright?

After everything you went through, didn’t you deserve to catch a break? After everything – Argost and the Nagas, Doyle and the People, the Secret Scientists, Legion of Garuda, Weird World, Lemurians, Abbey Grey, Leonidas Van Rook, Piecemeal and Fisk, Zon, Komodo…

It wasn’t fair and you knew it, everyone knew it. Watching on the sides with pity in their eyes. You pushed through because you wanted so desperately, _angrily_ for it to be fine, for it to be alright, for it to be the happy ending you knew you were supposed to get, but…

Does it get to be fine for you? You’re Zak Saturday, after all.

_You’re Kur, after all._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of Van Rook's and Zak's death, lots of descriptions of Zak having headaches, then he falls off a tree but doesn't die.


	2. may it never be restored.

Doyle had inherited a whole mess of troubles with Van Rook’s death - a staggering amount, really, considering how poorly his business was doing after it'd been stolen from him. Abbey Grey had been meticulous about keeping vendettas towards her teacher out of her hair, and so now all the cleanup was left to her predecessor. Supposedly, it was bad luck to speak ill of the dead, but that didn’t seem to stop all the debtors coming to call.

So the merc had taken Zon out with him, before the trouble with the headaches began, and checked in often as he could, but he was usually too tied up in his own matters to be of any help to the rest of the family. Scores had been settling down some, he’d said in the last call, so he might be able to swing by for a flesh-and-blood meeting soon; unfortunately, it’d been about a week of radio silence since then, and prospects were looking slim.

It was doubtful Zak would be up for a meeting, though, even if Doyle did surprise with a visit. He’d come down with what seemed like a cold - shivering, hot and cold flashes, lethargy – but, like the headaches, there didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it. No medication worked to alleviate the symptoms, and no tests were able to come back with a cause. Meanwhile, the migraine attacks were still ravaging him, pretty much at random, and while Zak adamantly refused to be bedridden, neither was he up for any sort of real action. It'd taken all his persuasive might and puppy-dog eyes to get his parents to let him go with them on missions, and even then, despite himself, he usually had to turn back early.

Since nothing had been found as to the nature of his affliction, the family had decided there was little they could do but keep an eye on him and go about life as usual. That Doc and Drew pulled late nights searching for something – _anything -_ that could help wasn’t a fact they thought Zak needed to know. He already had his own life to worry about, without him worrying about theirs. But he noticed their efforts, and they knew he he knew, so what could any of them do? No one felt comfortable bringing it up, so instead they'd chat idly about _anything_ else.

One of Drew’s latest theories was that the headaches were being caused by some kind of hungry ghost, maybe in a Buddhist or Shinto tradition. Doc, as a testament to how far gone he was, had started to worry that she might be on to something.

If there was a silver lining at all, it was that Zak had been able to rest in the comfort of his own home, now that the globetrotting adventure to save the world was over. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed not being constantly on the move, constantly being hounded by Scientists out for his life, constantly being stalked by a crazed megolomaniac supervillain, until he'd finally been able to rest. A surprising amount was salvageable from the ruins Fiskerton had left in his instinct-fueled rampage, and while the east wing was still under construction, contractors buzzing around it like bees in a hive, the only things that weren’t more or less rebuilt were the bedrooms. Doc and Drew had set themselves up in the control room; Zak and Fisk had claimed the living room. They'd immediately gotten video games hooked up to the new TV (Zak may or may not have used "saving the world" as an excuse to wheedle the latest consoles out of his parents) and made themselves comfortable on the couch, which had already turned into a veritable pillow fort, with a blanket awning and a secret snack compartment. If he was going to be bedridden, he'd do it in style.

Doc would spend most of his time cycling between the med-bay and his own personal tech lab searching for answers, a path that usually took him behind their setup, where they'd grunt out greetings to each other as he passed, his nose buried in digital readouts from his commpad. Drew spent her days in the library, reorganizing what was left over from Fisk's rampage, taking stock of what was left of their collection. In a stroke of luck, some of the shelves had collapsed in such a way as to shield the entire Sumerian section from falling debris, and in turn the debris had shielded the aging tomes from the elements. The entire collection had survived completely intact.

How suspicious, Drew had thought, as her finger traced down a yellowed page.

They were still on-call for cryptid activity, but the volume of requests had dwindled down to what it was before the mess with Kur had started in the first place, a break for which all the family was grateful.

If he was being honest, Zak had been concerned about running back into the field without his powers. They'd been with him for years before he even knew what "Kur" was, after all, and he wasn't sure what he'd do without them. Doc replied, smartly, that they’d managed before and they could manage again. And to his credit, they DID manage, one way or another.

Still, Zak hadn’t realized how much his powers had meant until he lost them. It wasn’t just that he suddenly had to start being careful, now that he couldn’t sense a cryptid’s general presence (though that was certainly part of it); it was that the creatures that used to readily accept his company as if he was one of their own now turned and hissed, bit and scratched like they would toward any other human.

Any other human. He should feel happy about that.

More than the frustration he felt with his inability to connect, however, was the emptiness he couldn’t shake - the certainty that some essential part of him was missing. The hollow space inside his heart was something he couldn’t get used to, no matter how many times he crossed paths with one of the creatures he used to know. Every time his eyes would meet the gaze of a cryptid, Zak felt himself unconsciously reaching for something that wasn’t there, something that used to be scorching-hot and familiar. Its absence now left him cold and off-center, stranger in his own body, scrabbling for purchase on empty air.

Encounters like that led invariably to headaches, but worse than the shooting pain of the migraines was the thought of never interacting with cryptids ever again. That fear always gripped Zak with an unspeakable sadness.

Fiskerton was ever-present at Zak’s side now, leaving only for nighttime cavorts when Zak was asleep. They were a team - no, they were _brothers_ , so he’d insisted on hovering, over Zak’s protests. And sure, he smelled like dog and woods and whatever it was he’d eaten for dinner last night, but the warmth of his body and the strength of his grip saw Zak through some of his worst. Zak was grateful, even if he didn’t say anything out loud.

With their best efforts, they tried for normalcy. Even if Zak's body protested that something was very, very, very wrong.

It was one of those "normal" mornings that finally broke the silence, one that found Zak and Fisk under the blanket fort, Zak thrashing the lemurian 2-1 in a racing game.

“Bhrrbazawah! Garrarugu!!” _You cheated!_

“Did not.”

“Mrrrr…” Fiskerton did not sound convinced.

“Look, not telling you about the shortcut on Misty Castle isn’t _cheating_ , it’s giving myself a _tactical advantage_. And I beat you the first time fair and square.”

“Dree-ouda-firrve.”

“You’re on.”

The cheerful guitar riff was about to announce the start of a new game when Doc poked his head into the room. “Have you boys seen your mother?” he asked. His brow was creased with concern and he seemed a little lost in thought.

“I think she’s in the library, like usual. Is something wrong?”

“Oh, uh…” he paused to think. “You know what, I think you ought to see this too. Can you two go get her and meet me in the conference room? It’s…important.”

Well, that was vague. “Like, bad-important or good-important?”

“I-don’t-know-yet-but-it-doesn’t-bode-well-important.” He gave a short account of the call he’d just received with some trepidation in his voice.

Fisk growled, Zak grimaced. “Oh.”

He leapt to his feet and tugged Fiskerton after him down the hall. The hallways were still somewhat bare and sparse in furniture, and family photos in cracked frames leaned against the wall where the parents insisted they’d eventually hang them up. The library was at the end, big double-doors with temporary handles on them while the wiring for the automatic sensors was being set up.

Drew looked up from her seat as the door was pulled open. _The Wiccan’s Guide to Supernatural Maladies_ , Zak caught the title as she set it down.

“Witches?” He asked. “Seriously?”

She shrugged with a sheepish smile. “I’m ready to give anything a shot at this point.”

Komodo, who’d been keeping her company, gave a big yawn and ambled over.

“So what do you need?” Drew said.

“Um,” Zak scratched the back of his head nervously. “Before I get to that…you know how you said you’re ready to give _anything_ a shot?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Uh, anyways, dad wants us in the conference room.”

“Don’t change the subject on me…”

“I’m not, it’s related. He says he just got a call from a snake. Or more like a snake dropped into the room and told him to get the rest of the family together.”

It took a moment for his words to register in Drew’s mind. She swore.

“Nagas,” she said.

 

* * *

 

A ring-necked snake was coiled up on the keyboard, illuminated by the pale blue glow of the screens, lazily flicking its tongue in and out like it had every right to be there. It didn’t seem to notice Drew’s death glare, nor did it seem to register Fiskerton’s warning growls; dimly Zak remembered his father once teaching him that snakes did not have eyelids.

Snakes never blinked.

Zak was the last one to enter the room, both his mother and his brother having pushed him behind them for protection. The serpent did not stir until Zak entered its line of sight, whereupon the front half of its body rose smoothly into the air and bowed in his direction in greeting. Drew stepped aggressively forward.

“What do you want?” she spat.

Rani Nagi’s voice issued smoothly forth from the serpent’s open mouth, cool and venomous.

“Calm yourself, Saturday woman. We mean no harm to you or yours. We merely wished to make a bargain. It will be mutually beneficial, I assure you.”

Doc was standing off in the far corner, arms crossed and brow low. “’Mean no harm’?" he asked. "For some reason I find that hard to believe. Our son’s not Kur anymore, so I don’t see where all this supposed goodwill is coming from.”

“I assure you, human, there is no goodwill involved,” Rani hissed at him. “We are simply fond of simple methods. Your human hands can do for us something we cannot; in turn, we have something you may be able to make use of. One in turn for the other. And I am quite sure you will find it hard to refuse.”

“We’ll do our best,” Drew said.

The snake turned to look at her out of its left eye, its tongue drawing in and out. “I do not think it wise for you to make up your mind before you at least hear our offer, Saturday.” Her tone was measured, but tinged with glee, as if she had already won the argument. “We know what it is that ails your son. More importantly, we know how to fix it.”

Drew’s mouth twisted. She’d expected as much – there wasn’t anything on the table that would be as effective a bargaining chip, after all – but hell if she was going to let these twisty snake bastards _win_. “Prove it.”

“We cannot.”

“Then no deal.”

“That would be unadvisable,” Rani Nagi purred, “as the child has less than a year left to live, and I suspect that we are your only hope.”

“It’s a scare tactic,” Doc growled, but Drew still hesitated. She’d expected what their offer would be, but not an expiration date. Fiskerton babbled in concern, high-pitched and worrying.

Should they believe in the naga's words? The snakes favored playing off emotional weaknesses, but it was hard to think of a time where they outright lied. Rani Nagi herself seemed supremely confident in her diagnosis. And...it wasn't like the Saturdays had found any answers. If anyone would know...then it may be the ancient race of mystics, their magic black as it may be.

In the end, the Saturdays simply did not  _know_ enough. The fact was, Zak's ailment - its nature, and its cause - eluded them. Was  _secret_ to them.

Doc and Drew were both tired, bags beneath their eyes. Fiskerton tried not to show it, but the worry was eating him, too. It killed Zak to see his family like this, more than his cold, more than his migraines, it really did. If the naga were being truthful, then would it be worth the risk?

Zak steeled his glare and stepped forward, shaking off Fiskerton’s hand against his protests. If they were going to be negotiating with the naga, then let him be the one to speak - he, who knew them best.

“Not saying that we’re accepting," he said, "but what exactly do you want from us?”

“Zak,” Drew warned, but she was cut off by Rani Nagi’s laugh.

“The child seems to know what’s best,” she said, turning to look at him, and he winced as a needle of pain shot up behind his eyes when he met that gaze. “Very well, little Saturday, let me lay out the exact terms. We seek the ancient greatspear Sharur, the weapon wielded by the blasphemous human that stole our late master’s life five thousand years ago. It lays in Kur’s ancestral home, but our kind cannot approach it; it is warded against snakes. We will tell you what we know once you retrieve it; you need not surrender the weapon until you verify our information as true.”

“And why exactly are you after this ‘Sharur’?” He tried to ignore the building pressure, his heartbeat throbbing sickly in his ears.

“It has sentimental value to us,” she replied coolly. “We should like to burn and destroy the foul thing. Fear not – aside from its ward against snakes the spear holds no special power. This you can verify with your own hands.”

“And something like that’s worth curing me?”

“Humans are insignificant,” the snake flicked its tongue out, “whether they live or die is of no consequence to us. And as you are, you are a _mere_ human.”

Something about Rani Nagi was rattling the pain into the open. The nausea and vertigo were worse than usual; the room swayed beneath his feet. Still, he held his ground, fists clenched at his sides. Zak Saturday was not in the business of running from a fight.

Nagas were…liars, tricksters, untrustworthy; Nagas were the scourge of the ancient world, black magic practitioners, venomous backstabbers. That there would be a hidden, poisonous twist to this deal was not _plausible_ , it was _certain_. They’d waited to tell the Saturdays, they’d waited until the Saturdays were desperate, desperate enough to hear them out. Desperate enough to agree.

Of course it was about Kur again. It had to be - why else would the naga act? Why else would they come  _here_ _?_ And though Rani Nagi denied it, Zak knew that meant it was about _him_ again. So that’s why only he…

He could tip over at any moment, but he dug his nails into his palms and put one excruciating foot in front of the other until he was standing so close to the waiting serpent that it could reach out and bite him.

“No deal.” He said those words loud enough that everyone in the room could hear him.

And then, under his breath, before turning away, he whispered in a low voice so that only the serpent could hear him.

“Wait until after dark.”

The snake hissed angrily at his retreating back and disappeared through the ventilation shaft.

* * *

 

Night came slowly, as Zak watched the sun paint the sky in orange and red from the corner of his eyes as he recovered from the afternoon migraine amidst his parents' fussing. In low tones, they were arguing, back and forth, about the veracity of the snake queen's claims, about whether or not they really _might_ know the secret that would bring their son back to them. Intermittently, Zak slept, as the pain quietly began to ebb out of his bones, and by the time the sky was black, and his parents were in bed, and Komodo had curled up at the foot of his couch, snoring as loud as a lizard could, and Fiskerton had disappeared for a nightly cavort, Zak was feeling about as in his sorts as he could.

Out on the balcony, he found the naga's messenger waiting for him.

"So you have decided to accept my bargain, little Saturday?"

The tone she was using was almost sweet, and Zak shuddered from a combination of the chilly night air and flashbacks of the first time she'd dragged him underwater and nearly drowned him. The water rushing in where air should be and the flickering of his powers to the dark promises she'd made...a pang shot through his skull.

"Not accepting. I just need more information."

"How shrewd of you..." her tone held some impatience, but she did not refuse.

He'd had some time, after sleeping off the worst of his migraine, to give the situation a careful examination. He'd been given time to prepare, and he'd come armed.

"Well then, child? What do you have to ask of me?"

She was being nice. She was being _too_ nice, that was what he'd decided. Even if all that bull about Zak's life being insignificant enough that they'd wager it for a spear was true, there was still no reason for them to act so accommodating - especially when they had such a trump card as a cure on their side. But what exactly did that mean?

He had to keep Rani Nagi talking, test how far she was willing to go.

"On a scale from one to death trap, how hard is it actually going to be to get that spear?"

"I admit we were not entirely truthful about ease of access," Rani Nagi admitted. "The spear lays at the bottom of a cave, and the cave is protected by a spell that turns away all who are not sure of their destination. Thus, we will have to provide you a guide. There may be remnants of magic protecting the inner chambers...but, of those, we are as blind as you. However, that damnable human Gilgamesh entered and returned to tell the tale; surely your lot will be capable of it, as well."

That was more honesty than he'd expected. They weren't trying to be evasive. Interesting.

He had to admit he was at least somewhat intrigued by the idea of following in Gilgamesh's footsteps, but he shook off the thought. Negotiating with an evil snake queen now. Fanboying over a five-thousand year old myth later.

"This sounds like the perfect setup for a trap," Zak said.

Rani Nagi laughed. "If we wanted revenge on your family, we would have simply sent a viper to bite you in your sleep."

Scary a thought as it was, that was a fair point. But she'd let the conversation slip from her, making assurances rather than demands, letting Zak's concerns take the lead. The Rani Nagi Zak knew was neither this patient nor this kind. Upon meeting resistance, her preferred method was to overpower, not compromise - so her willingness to do the latter meant that she needed this deal to go through as much as Zak did. And that meant that her true goal in all of this had to be...

He didn't let his epiphany show on his face.

"Mom and dad'll never say yes. They don't trust you - I mean, neither do I. And I don't know if you've noticed, but mom has kind of a grudge."

"Your parents do not need to know."

"How'll I get away?"

"We can provide you the distraction you need."

"Where exactly is this cave?"

"In a valley in the Zagros mountains, to the northwest of Tigris and Euphrates."

Just a hop-skip away from Sumer.

Zak pretended he was torn, like something was still biting at him. He let the crickets fill up the silence as he counted his breaths, one, two. Rani Nagi had come this far, offering a solution to every issue he presented, and he knew desperate when he saw it - and he'd weaseled too many things from his parents to not know how to take advantage.

Five...six. Rani Nagi took the bait.

"Are the terms not agreeable to you, Saturday?"

He deserved a goddamn Oscar.

"I'm just thinking," Zak said, with a fake tone of indecisiveness, "if this 'guide' of yours is one of those big, buff snakes you usually have as bodyguards, this still might be a trap. Bad guys like getting revenge with their own two hands, and, let's face it, we pretty much ripped your god out of existence. That's plenty motive for revenge in my book."

Rani Nagi hissed at the reminder - Zak smiled innocently - before she collected herself. The snake reared up to its full height, Zak's eye level, and the serpent queen delivered her ultimatum.

"Fine. Then we shall send with you the weakest of our kind, one even _you_ would be able to kill unarmed. But I will make no more compromises, Saturday boy! Remember that it is _you_ who needs this deal to live."

"I'd say let's shake on it, but it looks like you don't have hands."

"One week, little Saturday. You will know us when we come."

With a pompous flourish, the snake turned its back and slid down the railing into the forests below. Zak stood in the night breeze alone, taking in the West Coast sea tang, coming down off the adrenaline. His head was starting to pound again, though not as hard as earlier in the day; he was about to turn back towards the house when a big furry blur dropped into sight and nearly scared him over the veranda.

"Brrzhwer!! Aazhuwaah!!!" _Are you absolutely out of your mind!_

"Fisk! Oh my god. How long were you listening to us?"

"Grrrzherewer..." He was wagging his finger, with a look of stern disappointment on his face.

"No, are you crazy? You can't snitch on me to mom and dad! Look, if you'll just listen for a second..."

Fisk turned his nose up. "Bubrrzhr."

Oh, no. He had to explain fast. "Look, Fisk, she was crazy desperate to make that deal. So I thought, 'what's so special about the spear that killed Kur that would make the Nagas want it that badly?'"

"Mrrr..."

"It's the same thing they've wanted this whole time. Find Kur, destroy the humans."

"Guzhr...krrshuhrrshrr..." he gestured his confusion. Kur had been destroyed, been literally zapped into non-existence. Where the heck was Zak going with this?

"Yeah, but think: how did Kur come back in the _first_ place?"

Fiskerton was into it now, brow furrowed in concentration. When the lightbulb went off, he tapped his palm with his fist. "Krrstrrn."

"Right, the Kur stone." His eyes twinkled. "Because it contained some of Kur's essence, yeah? So what else do you think would have enough Kur juice to make a new Kur?"

Fisk's ears drooped as he came to Zak's conclusion. "Sharur."

"Right," Zak said, grinning triumphantly. "So that's why we're going to find it. And then we're going to _destroy_ it."

 

* * *

 

The "distraction" had taken the form of a pair of serpents wreaking havoc in the human settlements on the Zagros mountains - they were really more like legless lizards, Zak thought to himself, but it seemed Rani Nagi's powers didn't care to make that distinction. It had been easy to feign a headache so he and Fisk would stay behind on the ship (and since his head always did kind of throb at least a little, technically it wasn't even really a lie); from there, it was simply a matter of grabbing a prepped spelunking backpack and slipping out. The condition Fisk had for going along was they contact the parents at the first hint of trouble.

Their guide had met them in the woods, startling them with her jet-black scales and bright red eyes, but she quickly destroyed herself any intimidation factor she may have had.

Mucalinda, or Muca, as she'd introduced herself, was quite possibly the least intimidating thing Zak and Fisk had ever seen.

She was maybe a head taller than Zak was, that was to say, a total runt of a naga, an excitable thing with big bright eyes and a constantly wagging tail that gave Zak the unshakeable impression of a puppy. She talked like a puppy, too, in a high-pitched, overly-cheerful squeak. Her clothes were modest in comparison to Rani Nagi's royal guard, mostly leather with sparse golden decorations, and she had a shock of raggedy red hair tied loosely into a ponytail.

Fisk relaxed around her when he realized he could probably snap her in half with his bare hands.

Her age ("I am only one-hundred and thirty-six years old, barely even a hatchling!") accounted for her small size; this was the farthest she'd ever been from home. But no worry, she insisted, she knew the way even better than she knew the catacombs of the naga's nests, which she was always getting lost in. The location of Kur's ancient home was a secret dearly guarded by the historians in the naga tradition; Muca had been promoted to court historian just two years ago.

The brothers had learned all this within the first twenty minutes of their hike down the mountain, as Muca chittered endlessly about whatever crossed her mind. Somewhere in the middle she'd given an apology - this was the first time she'd had contact with non-nagas, she was nervous - but it was swallowed up by the rest of her monologue.

Zak struggled to imagine Rani Nagi putting up with Muca's rambling until he was informed that the queen actually spent most of her time trying to keep Muca far, far away. To be honest, Zak was surprised Rani Nagi hadn't just gotten fed up with Muca and eaten her. Muca had assured him that none were more surprised than Muca herself.

"Rani Nagi does not have a high opinion of us tablet scratchers, you see." The downward slope was easier for Muca to traverse than Zak, and she often paused to wait up for him.

"So why don't you just quit?" Zak asked.

"Oh, well," Muca said, fidgeting. "I might. After this assignment. Have I mentioned my excitement?"

"Only like, five times."

"I will miss the libraries, however. Very big, full of rock slabs with writing all over them, very rat-infested. So there is always something running around to eat."

"Oh," Zak said. "So you uh, eat rats?"

"They're very BIG rats."

"Right.”

“You do not?”

“I’m more a...soda and potato chips kinda guy. Fisk might, though.”

“Gawawr!” He was offended, even though the accusation was true.

“Oh, I see! Humans really are disgusting,” Muca said, without change to her cheerful tone of voice. “I hope they all get wiped out.”

“Uh,” Zak said, raising an eyebrow at the sudden shift of topic. “By who?”

“Oh, um, hum. Anyone, I suppose. Though Kur would be the best choice. But, really, anyone. The important part is the death of the humans.”

“But Kur’s gone,” Zak said, innocently, like he had no suspicions whatsoever.

“Yes,” Muca agreed.

Then they were silent for a while.

And then the brothers realized that the forest had grown silent, as well.

A bird called from far away, and then fell still, and the only sounds were the sounds of their passage through the dampened leaves. The water had begun to collect in the valley, further muting the heavy quiet. Fisk had been overcome with a sense of unease, checking over his shoulders every few steps, tensed for a threat that wasn’t there. Something great and horrible dwelled here, in the silence. He was _sure_.

Small pools and puddles had formed here and there, standing water still and unperturbed, glassy reflections of the canopies above; the only ripples forming as the party walked by. Blue-green moss covered the bark, witnessed their passing.

There were no birds. There weren’t even any bugs. The temperature dropped in the shade of the leaves, which had overgrown so thick they choked out all the branches near the ground and left the gnarled trees bare and naked and cold. Even they seemed lifeless, despite their greenery - even they seemed to be waiting.

Something in Zak’s heart was shivering. This earth had not been touched for thousands and thousands and thousands of years.

“ - for long.”

Muca had started talking again, but she sounded fuzzy and far away. “What?”

“We will not be walking for long, now,” Muca said, and Zak was sure that that was not what was said before.

“Stop here,” she reached out an arm as they reached their destination, a soft reverence having crept into her voice. It was dark here, the darkest it had been; quiet, the quietest it had been -

At their feet lay a massive pore in the earth, a hole sunk deep into earth and rock, sides slick with snowmelt. It stretched into dizzying blackness, hundreds - thousands, maybe - of feet below. The sides of the hole yawned so wide the canopy could not fully cover it; a single sunbeam dove like a needle into the depths of the gaping maw, was swallowed up by the shadow within.

Zak peered over the edge and saw black.

Black after black after black.

Kur-Gal, Muca breathed the name behind him. The netherworld.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Exposition, Zak has a really bad headache, and makes what seems to be a bad decision. Rani Nagi speaks through a snake and offers a deal to fix him.


	3. To the netherworld they descended.

Gilgamesh, the warrior-king of ancient Sumer, lived circa 2850-2750 BCE. His heroic exploits were detailed in a series of tablets known collectively as The Epic of Gilgamesh. Unfortunately, almost none of them survived the ravages of war and time. The few that remain detailed, in broken fragments, his victory against a malevolent snake-god, and the mysterious stone left behind; all else is now dust and ash.

Roughly five thousand years ago, Gilgamesh journeyed to the netherworld. Roughly five thousand years ago, Gilgamesh alone journeyed out.

The cave, now crypt, had been untouched ever since.

“Gwerzhrrvr…” Fisk grumbled.

“Oh, shut up,” Zak grumbled back. “At least you have fur to keep you warm."

The pattering of falling snowmelt dripping like rain echoed down the cave, obscuring the sound of their footprints. Zak wondered if he'd ever be dry, ever again.

"Speaking of which - hey, Muca, you’re cold-blooded, right? Aren’t you, uh…cold?”

“Oh, I am. Definitely,” Muca said. Zak raised an eyebrow when she said nothing more.

All in all, aside from the dark and the damp, this certainly was one of the nicer caves Zak had explored. The absence of animal life outside extended within - honestly, he’d expected there to be more skulls decorating the lair of an evil god.

The cavern walls were dug into limestone, glazed smooth by the constant flow of water down their sides. It pooled near the edges of the cavern in holes worn out by time, bordered by stalagmites that seemed new in comparison to their surroundings. Small blind fish drifted listlessly through the stagnant pools, or so Zak thought, until a closer look had him jump back, spooked, by the dozens of greasy black eyelets running down the worms’ segmented sides.

What his parents wouldn’t give to see this, he thought in horrified fascination, as Cambrian annelids swam languidly in their ancient pools, untouched by the extinctions that should have wiped them out. Above them was a mural painted in the fossilized bone of the Mesozoic sea, massive hints of ancient fish that died while in the middle of spawn, so perfectly preserved they looked like ghosts.

His dad could probably come up with a better explanation of how those two time periods ended up next to each other, all the way into the present day; his mom would probably say something about the magic so thick Zak could choke on it.

He winced. His parents. He prayed that Rani Nagi could keep them distracted for long enough.

And he hoped this adventure wouldn’t be something he’d make them regret.

The path sloped down in a gentle spiral, yawned high above them. The floor in the center of the cave was worn smooth with the commutes of the cavern’s late owner, now treacherous for the griseous sheen the water left calcified on the ground, as the blackness of below drew them ever closer to the center of the earth.

A predatory lineage was carved into the cavern wall: dunkleosteus to ichthyopterygia, ichthyopterygia to mosasauroidea, and mosasauroidea to basilosaurus. Zak could trace their descent by the fossil record, a biblical record of prehistory. Humans were the blink of an eye.

He paused to imagine the creature that used to live here, a being defined more by what wasn’t known than what was. “Ancient before man’s time began,” Argost had boasted to him once, but even when he was Kur’s reincarnation, Zak had never felt ancient - humans just weren’t equipped to understand that scale of time. But standing here, in a cave decorated by the remains of creatures Kur had outlasted, Zak suddenly felt very small. He felt like he could almost understand what ancient meant.

In the end, they knew so little about the cryptid Kur. And everything was over before they had a chance to learn more; they’d shut the door, sealed the edges, and locked it. It was just the safest thing to do.

The light level rising in the cavern happened so slowly that they didn’t notice it at first; it was Fisk elbowing Zak to point out the bioluminescent lichen that grew on the wall that made him exclaim that he could see without his lamp on. Muca extinguished her torch. Though it took their eyes a little to adjust, yes, indeed, it was bright enough that they could see - dim, like twilight, or maybe the sunrise. The blue light was almost welcoming, if only because its ambience didn’t throw every shadow into sharp relief, make every crevice look like a hiding-hole something was waiting to jump out of.

No, it wasn’t just the pale blue illuminating the cave - there was something else, something deeper in, something further down. How long had they been walking? How deep had they penetrated into the crust? Was it unreasonable to expect the mantle of the earth?

The slope didn’t feel very steep, nor did they seem to have been down here for any more than an hour, and yet…

The path widened into a cavern, and then another, and another, each cave ringed with translucent stalagmites, each ceiling covered with the thousand teeth of ancient stalactites. The echos of their footsteps were swallowed by the distant sound of running water. Annelids and primitive mollusks preened in the rippling pools.

The hackles on Fisk’s neck still raised up, despite himself. He didn’t like where they were going. He didn’t like what was up ahead. He nudged at Zak's arm, itching for him to break the silence. Zak obliged.

“Kur’s old home, huh? You know, I was expecting it to look more evil. This place almost looks...nice.”

“Mm?” Muca said, snapped out of her reverie. “Oh, yes! Well, I admit, I did, too. Certainly something with more death and fire and destruction. But this is also good. Well, everything about Kur is pretty good, I think.”

Zak rolled his eyes. “I dunno if ‘good’ is the right word to describe an evil genocidal snake god.”

“He wasn’t just genocidal and evil,” Muca protested. “Only mostly. Most of the time.”

“What was he the rest of the time?”

“According to the ancient tablets, he was very, very mean.”

Fisk grunted, deadpan.

“You never met him yourself?”

“Well…” Muca said, “I met you. But your predecessor, no. Our queen was his advisor…”

That annoyed him. “I’m not Kur anymore.”

“Oh! Right. Yes. Apologies, apologies.” She bowed her head slightly. “I’ve still met you, though. You weren’t really quite what I expected.”

“Really? Then what were you - “

Fisk managed to pull him out of the path of a giant stone halberd just in the nick of time. The boom of its impact against the ground echoed through the netherworld, rattled through Zak’s bones, threatened at a headache about to erupt.

“Whoa!” he yelped. “What the - “

The weapon lifted and their assailant came into view, a giant stone statue with an angry scowl carved on his face, facsimile of armor carved in his red, sandstone body.

Shit.

“Run, this way!” Muca called, visibly shaking. Fisk ran to meet her, stone sentinel hot on his heels, as they rushed deeper into the caves.

“What the heck is that thing?” Zak yelled over the soldier’s footsteps. “Rani Nagi didn’t mention giant rock statues coming to life and trying to kill us!”

“I’m sorry!” Muca yelled back, panicking. “I don’t know!”

“You don’t know??”

“I have a confession to make! I am not qualified to be a full court historian! It’s just that our old one died a horrible painful death and there’s no one left!”

The weapon came down again, missed Muca’s tail by only a breath.

“I kind of figured!” Zak yelled, when the ringing in his ears subsided.

“Even still a statue of a human soldier carved by human hands doesn’t seem like the sort of thing a snake without arms who tried to murder a lot of humans would use so I would assume it is probably not an original addition - “

“Breathe, Muca!”

Muca did. “It is probably something someone put in after Kur died! So we wouldn’t know about it! That would be my guess!”

“Great! Now how do we beat it!”

“Ummmm!!!!!”

Fisk didn’t have time for this. The path in front of them took on a sudden, sharp downward slope. He grit his teeth and bared them in a snarl. It was already hard enough to run, with how slippery the ground was, without - oh.

Zak was thinking the same thing. “Fisk!”

“Garr!”

He grabbed Zak by the shirt, turned on his heel, and threw him to the other side of the cavern, where Zak dug in his heels and skidded to a stop, one hand already on the claw. He grabbed it and swung - the hand at the end, prongs open, went flying; it was caught deftly by the Lemurian, as Muca watched from the side, where she'd been thrown by Fisk for safety. Together, the brothers pulled the string taut, and together they rushed the stone sentinel with the claw between them.

The statue ran into it and its ankle caught and for an bated second it was poised mid-run, Zak and Fiskerton straining against its weight, before momentum and gravity took their dues and toppled the golem headfirst down the slope. Its stone head cracked and crumbled and went clamoring down into the blackness.

For a brief moment the two shared a breathless triumph, flashing smiles, until the string pulled tight again, claw having caught on the rough rock of the automaton, and Zak was pulled screaming down into the black depths of the cavern with it.

Fisk yelled and ran down after him, and slipped on the water. He slid uncontrollably down the slick path, scrabbling for purchase the entire way. His stomach turned and fluttered and felt sick and the bottom of the cave dropped away and gravity had stopped and then Fisk was falling - screaming - until he hit cold water that muffled and distorted the world, distorted the yellow-orange glow -

He broke the surface with a gasp, dragged himself, heavy with snowmelt, onto land.

Zak. There was Zak, standing, dripping, facing something in the center of the room.

“Zhrk!”

He didn’t respond.

“Zhrkk!!”

He didn’t even notice Fisk was there.

It was so bright. Too bright, compared to the rest of the cave. Odd shadows were thrown on the walls of the crypt by the stalagmites sticking up in even rows, smooth and covered with the lustrous sheen of crystal, reflective, refractive, an echo chamber of something bright like fire burning in the center of the room.

Ribs - those weren’t stalagmites, they were ribs. Massive ribs, jutting out like stone pillars, coated in the same crystal as the walls, frozen, untouched, for thousands of years, lined up like ivory fangs, curled inwards like angry claws -

Fisk was too wet, too heavy, too unwieldy - he ran for Zak, couldn’t find any purchase, fell hard on his chest.

He called again, after Zak’s stumbling frame, which was being pulled inexorably towards the mouth at the center of the cavern, great teeth of the snake god pried open in death throes, a pavilion to house Sharur still buried deep in Kur’s ancient skull.

Something terrible would happen if Zak were to touch it. Unforgivable. That primeval part of Fisk’s mind, the buried instincts, the howling warnings of something he knew but didn’t know - he had to stop Zak, before it was too late. Before it was too late.

The light bound by Sharur was blinding. It was beautiful. It was warm, like a hearth, like a heart, like...like something Zak couldn’t even remember, something rooted in his bones and teeth, something pulsing through his arteries. The pain, the headaches - he recognized them now: hunger; he was hungry, starving, _dying_ for this.

What he’d been reaching for, what he hadn’t been able to find, that something essential that he’d lost without even knowing he’d lost it - here it was! He’d found it! He could almost laugh at his good fortune, at this windfall, at his ridiculous elation. It was right here this entire time.

He moved without thinking, reached out without thinking, ignored the dim clamor of someone screaming his name. He _needed_ this.

He extended his hand into the orange flames. The cavern exploded in energy and light.

The fire burned him, singed him, seared his entire being. Like a fever, it chased away the dull aches, the stiffness in his joints, the heaviness he hadn’t known he’d been carrying. Those hollow spaces, empty places, it poured in like lava, hissing where it met him, heart, body, mind, and soul -

This scorching flame, it cleaned him. It comforted him. It welcomed him back into the world of the living. He felt like he was taking his first breath.

And then, as the light subsided, as the magic in the cavern crumbled, as the netherworld gave a shudder and began to collapse in on itself, Zak closed his eyes and slipped soundlessly into the blackness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of worms and mollusks, not too vividly described but what I did describe were, like, the grosses parts, and near the end Fisk has a moment where he's submerged underwater, so watch out for that. In the middle there's some stuff where a giant stone golem pretty much nearly kills them, but that's pretty on-par with the series' level of darkness.
> 
> Also if you're a super nerd like me, then all that hobgobberish at the beginning about Gilgamesh and Sumer and those made up dates - that's just the Gilgamesh in the TSS/my headcanon TSS universe, so don't pay it any mind. I took and will take kind of a _whole hecking ton_ of Artistic Liberty throughout this work, so if factual inaccuracy's morally reprehensible to you, then this is probably not the work for you.


	4. ex nihilo.

_The First Memory is of the sea._

_The warmth and way the currents sidled up to its body, how they washed over it like liquid silk, worried gently at the edges of the scales that keeled into the stream. How when the vents exhaled, the smoke tasted like rust and life, curled into its nose, spun languidly to the churning waves. How it dappled the red glow of the breathing planet below, how it scattered and dulled the scintillating blue of lightning above._

_How alive the Earth was back then, when its skies were in a frenzied state, blackened clouds of ash and smoke choking out the youthful sun, when mountains were pitched and blown over in a single breath, when the moon had just begun a faltering waltz with her planet and the two celestial bodies fumbled clumsily toward each other in an effort to keep time._

_The First Memory stretches on and on and on. The First Memory is a drowse, is a sleep. Is half awake, preconscious, a glassy reflection blinking at itself in a quavering tide pool. Is millennia – longer than millennia can describe. Eons and eons and eons passed by gently, quietly, lovingly, tenderly, as it lay uncoiled in the hadal of the Primordial Sea._

_Below it, the heaving planet shuddered and cried, then steeled itself against the raging storms, found itself in sheer cliff faces and mountain slopes._

_It watched the light filter through the smoke of the vents, envious of the way it danced._

_It watched the darkness purr over the waters, sift down like dust to close the raw wounds of the planet’s growth, to seal them up with gentle kisses, one by one._

_It watched as the light turned from electric blues to warm pinks and gold, as the planet’s first dawn peered lovingly over the quiet hills, the silent seas._

_It watched the sun reveal herself shyly, as if a bride on wedding day._

_And, pulling its great, shuddering body out of the warm womb of the Sea, it met her gaze, and held it…_


	5. Mark 8:31

Fiskerton broke gasping back into the light of the sun, Zak’s limp frame grasped tightly to his side. The earth below him groaned its dying breaths as the cavern collapsed, burying the body of the great snake forever beneath the bones of the ancient oceans. Gilgamesh, the first human to set foot in Kur’s primordial lair; Zak, the last.

In Zak’s swaying arms he held Sharur still, knuckles white with their grip like it was his lifeline pulling him back to shore.

Muca, the snake, tried to draw closer.

Fiskerton’s wrath turned her away.

He set the boy gently on the ground and then _roared_ at her, all the frustration and fury and that nagging sickly feeling still at the pit of his stomach, as if trying to eviscerate her with his anger alone. He’d be attacking her with his fists and teeth if he hadn’t had the rise and fall of Zak’s chest against his own to assure him that the boy was still alive.

She drew back, miserably, coiled into herself. “Apologies,” she insisted, “apologies. It was – it was the only way.”

 _The only way to do_ what?

She flinched, claw-fingers grasping onto each other so tightly they left marks in her scales, a mockery of the pious in prayer. Before the lemurian’s wrath she was shaking, acutely aware that if she died here, her body would never be found. They held, a tense minute, before she found it in herself to give him a straight answer, to stare him in the eyes in what she was sure would be her final moments.

“How can he live without his soul?” She asked, with a trembling voice. “He returned from death incomplete. This was – this was the only place left that could help him.”

Fiskerton did not say a word.

“To the very end and even beyond,” she said, in her tremulous pride, “we serve our lord and master Kur.”

The lemurian regarded her with contempt before finally pointing his finger behind her, all snarls and disgust. Too grim to be gratitude, too reluctant to be acknowledgement.

 _Leave,_ he growled, and then he picked up Zak’s unconscious body and trudged up the mountain for home.

 

* * *

 

The moon was waxing. Tonight was the night.

Two hunched figures worked in the dark and quiet of a cavern carved into the ancient mountainside, heavy with the task of reviving a god.

He would have kept some of his essence alive in something of his. They brought it with them, crackling with energy, something dark and disturbing and heavy.

The large one gave a questioning look as he ran his hand over the flat rock that had been chosen by the alignment of the stars, a smooth granite taller than he was.

“Yes, this is it,” rasped the smaller one. “It will be here that he will be reborn.”

The large one nodded and cleared a clean space out of the snow before the rock face. Even with his efforts, it was not long before the snowdrift from the hole above left a thin dusting of white over the ground. The large one moved to clean it, but the small one held up a hand and bid he wait.

The small one was not bothered by the cold.

He sat in the center of the circle of light, waiting for the moon to take its place. He turned his face upward and closed his eyes, legs crossed as if meditating, final piece of the Kur stone held close to his breast in what may have been grief, may have been sorrow.

 _Ah, old friend,_ he sighed in his native tongue, _wouldn’t it have been better if you had wanted less of the world? If I have a conscience, I should throw this away, and let you be born anew, clean of all your sins, that I may prevent your fate._  
  
He gripped the stone tighter to his chest.

_But it seems as though the both of us are lacking…_

The large one grew worried, unable to understand the smaller one’s soliloquy.

“It is all right,” the small one assured him. “I will make sure to carry it out.”

The large one was not appeased, but all the same he looked away.

_Doubtless you will chase that same destiny the same doom, old friend. I know you too well to know otherwise. So…forgive me._

The cavern began to grow bright with the reflected light of the moon, and the smaller one stood, orange fur turning white in the glow. The odd shadows refracted onto the stone face began to focus into a figure, too tall to be human –

_I want to see you again. I’ve missed you. So please return…and, though you will not listen -_

He threw the rock piece to the ground so hard that it shattered; its energy, released, searched the room voraciously until it found the granite stone, features being chiseled by the light of the moon. The tall one’s eyes filled with hope as the small one looked away.

_I beg you, let us meddle no more in the affairs of life and death and humanity._

But even as he uttered his wish, he knew it would not be granted, as it was swallowed up by the manic laughter that filled the cave and echoed down the mountainside, that whipped up a storm to obscure the moon, that frenzied the winds and ice and snow into a terrible, grotesque, and familiar dance.

The Xing-Xing cast his eyes away as a terrible storm began to brew.

 

* * *

 

The peaceful waters of the Hadean sea dissolved into the soft blue of the nightlight and the hum of the ship’s engine beneath him. Zak felt…stiff, tingly. Groggy, heavy.

But heavy was a welcome change from lightheaded, and the solidity of his limbs beneath him a welcome change from vertigo.

When he tried to push himself up to his shoulders, he found that he still grasped Sharur tightly in his right hand. Unflexing his fingers actually hurt, joints aching where they’d been locked in for…for who knew how long. He’d had to pull his arm up from the side of the bed, the side facing away from the door – he glanced over to see Fiskerton’s sleeping form keeping watch – so perhaps that positioning was his way of keeping the spear from being found by his parents.

Sharur, so proud in its place in Kur’s mouth – though Zak’s memories of that cavern were hazy at best – looked so much more its age up close. It must have been a cruel and noble weapon when Gilgamesh had wielded it, but now – now it seemed more fit to be a museum display than an instrument of the battlefield.

It was faded with time and age, metal cloudy and corroded, broken speartip dull and grey. Even the shock of fur that joined metal to shaft had faded from a proud, angry red to a matte brown. The wood itself was of good quality, still firm after these thousands of years, grain of the woodwork warm under Zak’s thumb, even through the milky crust of the crystal that coated the cavern.

He squinted where his finger caught, something carved into the whorls. He didn’t know enough to make sense of it, but he recognized it as the same script as was on the Kur stone – something carved lengthwise in Sumerian pictographs down the weapon’s side.

“Zhrrk?” Fiskerton’s voice, groggy behind him.

“Fisk?”

“Zhrk!” In a moment, Fisk was over him, grabbing his face and turning it in the dim light, grip too tight like he was afraid to let go. “Irsshrryoo?”

_Is that really you?_

Zak’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Uh, if by ‘you’ you mean ‘starving’…”

That was answer enough. Overjoyed, Fisk pulled Zak to his feet, Sharur forgotten on the bed, and nearly dragged him out of his room to the part of the ship that served as a kitchen. Somewhere along the line, Zak noted, he’d been changed into his pajamas, and while his hair still stank of the waters of the netherworld, it’d been dried into a tell-tale mess. Well, at least he wouldn’t be catching a cold from the ordeal.

Drew was rummaging around the drawers, which caused Fisk to freeze in nervousness, before he tried to act natural and lead Zak to the counter. Zak cocked an eyebrow at him. So his parents didn’t know about their trip, huh…

The clock above her read eleven-thirty PST, well past his curfew, but considering he had just spent the last few hours asleep, he figured no one would press him about it. He took a seat at the counter while Fisk got them juice and his mom’s head peeked up to look at him.

Yowch. There were twigs in her hair and grass stains all over her suit, which she hadn’t yet bothered to change out of. Those lizards must have really given her a run for her money. She was happy to see him, and her mouth quirked upwards as he winced at her state. “Hey, kiddo. Your dad managed to call the shower before me, so…”

“Wow, he finally won.”

“Give me more credit than that, Zak. I _let_ him win first dibs. After all, _he_ was the one that got swallowed by the female, not me. I’m surprised the stench didn’t wake you up.” She fitfully opened another few drawers, before closing them when what she was looking for evidently wasn’t in them. “Have you seen the oven mitts? I can’t find them anywhere. I wanted to pop some cookies in the oven while I waited…”

“No, haven’t seen them,” Zak said, gratefully nodding to Fisk as he was handed a glass of OJ. “You could probably just use a pair of gloves we got on the thermal suits, though.”

She smiled at the suggestion. “If your dad was here, he’d complain about how ‘it cost twelve thousand dollars to make that suit, you can’t just use them to make cookies because the oven mitts pulled a Houdini!’ Good thing he’s washing digestive slime out of his armpits, huh?” She walked around the counter to grab them, pulling Zak into a forehead kiss on the way. She wrinkled her nose at the odor caught on his hair. “You smell like you could use a shower yourself, kiddo.”

“Oh, well, you know,” Zak shrugged, “sleep farts.”

She gave him a laugh before running off to the hallway to grab the gloves and returned just in time for the oven to beep that preheating was over, already pulling the white material over her hands. “This might not be _super_ sanitary, but I figure whatever’s still left on these gloves’ll just burn off.” The blast of heat as she opened the front to stick the tray in felt nice on Zak’s skin. He closed his eyes.

“Are you up for leftovers?” Drew asked, already opening the fridge. Fisk whistled hungrily.

“Yeah. Actually, I’m so hungry I could eat _Fisk_.”

Fisk started “Whr!?”

Zak snickered. The lemurian grumbled and slumped down next to Zak’s seat when he realized the boy was joking.

This was nice, Zak thought. He’d forgotten what it was like to have an appetite. God, he’d forgotten what it felt like to be able to breathe to the bottom of his lungs. Forgotten what…

His eyes snapped open.

Forgotten what it was like not to have a headache.

He shook his head, ignoring his mom’s asking what he wanted. The room didn’t spin out from underneath him, nor did the sick throb that usually sat on his occipital like a gremlin begin to pulse.

Had it taken this long for him to realize that his hearing was crystal clear since he woke up? Actually, how long had he lived with the white-noise buzz in his ears? How long had he lived with the prickling black spots on the edges of his vision that he only noticed in their newfound absence? How long…

Fisk and Drew were both at his side, fearing another attack. He surprised them when he laughed, a genuine bubbling thing that he couldn’t keep back, like uncorking a bottle of soda.

“Mom,” he said. “Fisk. Guys. _Guys._ ”  
  
Their grip on them tightened, Fisk’s face was concerned, but he didn’t have any reason to be, so it just looked ridiculous for the situation. Everything was a little ridiculous, a little hilarious, a little delirious right now. But this was also the most elated Zak had been for…for the better part of a year.

“ _My head doesn't hurt anymore_ ,” he said, giddily. “I feel _great_.”

“Are – “ Drew swallowed. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” Zak said. “ _Yeah._ I – god, I – “

His stomach growled, loudly, protesting that the miracle cure was getting in the way of more pressing matters. His mom stared at him, then dropped her hands and ran back to the open refrigerator door.

“We’ll, uh, see how long it lasts.” Her expression was twisted, like she wasn’t sure if she wanted to let herself believe that some stroke of luck had saved him. Was it allowed to be that easy? “Until then, we should probably get some food in you. Does yesterday’s gumbo sound good?”

Zak broke out into a wide smile, squeezed Fiskerton’s hand. “Yeah, mom. That sounds _awesome_.”

Fisk loosened his grip as Zak repositioned himself at the table, grinning ear to ear. Unfortunately, unlike his brother, the lemurian could take no joy in the sudden development. Not when he knew the why and how.

Nothing that the nagas endorsed could be any good in the long run. No cure they proffered came without a price. And somehow, Fisk feared that Zak’s initial guess to the role of Sharur was right – that the restoration of Zak had been the resurrection of Kur. How many times did the world have to prove that the two were one and the same?

“Incomplete,” the word the small one had used to describe his situation. Indeed, given that diagnosis, the symptoms made sense – the dying throes of a soul trying desperately to hold onto its body, wasting away like sand in the wind. And now that soul was made complete, fixed with a graft from the original source. Fisk knew better than to think it would be so simply open and shut.

But, as Zak nudged him and asked what was wrong with big worried eyes, as Zak dug into the stew like a man starved, as Zak laughed genuinely for the first time in – in _months_ , Fisk decided it would be too cruel to divulge his fears. At least for now.

His appetite was gone with the proof that the naga’s cure had worked. But for Zak’s sake, he could eat, could pretend – at least for one night – that he didn’t suspect something was wrong.

Just for the night, he could pretend that his instincts – which hadn’t failed him since he’d awakened to them – were screaming about something terrible just on the horizon.

A storm, they whispered urgently in his ear. A storm was brewing, a calamity.

And without a doubt, Zak Saturday would again be right in the thick of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think this chapter is very bad at all!


	6. (D. Blackwell, personal communication, n.d.)

“So the guy’s base is burning all around him, his girlfriend just left him for his helicopter chauffeur, and his gun just got eaten by a _shark_ – you know, all-around, he’s just not having a good day. The boat’s sinking fast, we’re the only two left on it, I’m the one with a jetpack, and what does he decide to do?”

Zak and Fisk were enraptured. In the corner, Doc had his arms crossed, trying hard not to openly roll his eyes.

“ _He rushes me with a fork._ A fancy, expensive, sterling-silver _fork_. He almost got me with it too, I was laughing so hard. How are you even supposed to react to that?” Doyle grinned when he got the reaction he was looking for, Zak and Fisk snorting inelegantly into their hands.  “Anyways, I catch him by the wrist and pin it behind his back, then knock him out by ramming him into the wall. We drop him off at the nearest police station back on land. And that’s how Jurassic and I sank an illegal oil rig off the coast of Indonesia.”

He procured the fork from his pocket in a swift motion, twirling it in the light. He let Zak take it from his hands, with all the reverence of passing on a family heirloom. “It’s yours, Mini-Man.”

Zak’s voice was hushed with awe. “You mean it?”

“Yeah. But I’d wash it before using it, if you know what I mean.”

Too late – Fisk had already stuck the entire business end in his mouth.

Doc spoke up from his place in the corner, causing everyone to turn to him. “Thank you for the story, Doyle. It was very…” he paused to come up with the right word. “Factual.”

“I’ll write you up a bibliography, professor,” Doyle bit back, good-naturedly.

“Make sure it’s in APA.”

“Like I’d do you any less.”

Doyle leaned down to whisper in his nephew’s ear. “Do you know what a bibliography is?”

 

* * *

 

Uncle Doyle, in Zak’s opinion, was always a welcome distraction, no matter who or what he was distracting from. In this case, he happened to land on Saturday property just in time to interrupt the tail end of a series of tests Dr. David Bara (the Australian nutjob extraordinaire) had been running on his brain. Not a moment too soon, Zak had thought, as he’d run out of the room at top speed with Fisk and Doc hot on his heels. The boy shuddered to think what that pointy, sparking metal probe Dr. Bara was holding up could possibly have been used for.

Doyle looked a little rough around the edges, though he’d clearly made an effort to clean up some before arriving at the house. His hair was a bit longer than last Zak had seen him, and the shaven edge of the mohawk not as distinct as he usually kept it, little red fuzz blurring the edge, but all-in-all he didn’t seem to have any obvious new scars or injuries, and Zon looked as chipper as the day Zak brought her home – he supposed he couldn’t ask for anything more. The mercenary was not lacking in his usual bravado, and upon being invited inside he’d immediately made his home all over the new furniture, cracking jokes that he didn’t feel so bad about trashing the house that one time, now that he wasn’t the only one who’d done it. Fisk spluttered, offended.

He seemed bushed, taking lulls in the conversation to rest his head back against the couch and close his eyes. However, the moment Doc was called into the communications room by a blip on the cryptid hotline, Doyle sprang up and leaned over to have a man-to-man with his nephew.

“I saw Abbey a couple days ago. …Well, ‘saw’ is a bit of an understatement.”

“What, really?” Oh, Abbey. “How did she look?”

“Uh, evil.”

“R-right. I mean…just, how did it go?”

“First off, about as good as a meeting with an ex CAN go. Second, I managed to scare her off, but I’m pretty sure she got whatever she was going after.” He seemed displeased – the fight didn’t go in his favor, looked like. “Since we’re in the same business, meeting up probably couldn’t be avoided. I dunno who she’s working for now, just that her money definitely isn’t clean. Still: she sure is making a _lot_ of it.”

“What was she after?”

He sighed. “Just some artifact en route to the Louvre – I didn’t get any details. It’s probably decorating some crime lord’s bathroom wall now, though.”

“Wow. Things went that bad, huh?”

Doyle just let out a grunt in response. “At least things have been going better for you, Mini-Man.”

 “Yeah.” Zak smiled. The dreams he was having were getting weird, but dreams were just dreams, right? His parents were only trying to get to the bottom of them for science’s sake; Zak tried not to worry about it. What was much more important to him was the fact that he could go on missions again, be useful again. He’d missed the crunch of jungle underfoot, the crisp air. That was what he wanted to focus on.

“Hey, you know what would get Abbey off your mind?” Zak asked, with a devious grin.

“Oh boy. What?”

“Doing some cryptid stuff with us! Dad’s on the hotline right now, which means that we might be flying off somewhere soon – “

“Are you sure?” Doyle leaned forward, cautiously interested. “It’s not exactly like my methods have meshed well with Mr. Professor’s before…”

“Awh, Uncle Doyle, I just wanna spend some family time with you, since we _never_ see you around these days…” Zak put on his most sweet puppy-dog look he could, with Fisk joining in on the act. Doyle laughed.

“Well, if my favorite nephews are asking, I guess I could try to rein it in a bit so I’m not stealing Doc’s thunder…too much.” He smiled. “Besides, we could do with a short paid vacation, huh, Jurassic?”

Zon cawed in response, nuzzling up against Zak and Fisk. Doc had entered the room just in time to catch the tail end of Doyle’s reply.

“What’s this about a paid vacation?”

Zak turned his pleading look to his father instead.

Doc shook his head. “No. Nuh-uh, no.”

“Aw, but _daaaad_ , Uncle Doyle hasn’t been around for _so looooong_ \- “

“I don’t mind if he comes along for family time, but I’m not _paying_ him – “

“But I _can_ come along,” Doyle said, grinning.

“Wh – I didn’t – “

“You can sleep in my room on the ship!”

“He’s not coming – “

“Sounds like a plan. When do we leave, Doc?”

Doc heaved a sigh, defeated. “Two hours. I’ll go…prep the ship. Zak, you’ll go tell your mom when she and Dr. Bara are done?”

“You got it, dad,” Zak said, already dragging Doyle off for a game of armband tag in the cryptid plant basement.

 

* * *

 

The call had been from northwestern Wales, in an old town that had historical roots in the Kingdom of Gwynedd. There had been reports of villagers getting attacked at night by giant black dogs with flaming eyes; when traditional animal control methods were unable to even catch a sighting of the creatures, the Saturdays got the call.

Since the events of the Kur stone, the family found themselves enjoying a measure more fame than before, which meant that some of the more obscure cases had begun to pop up from remote locales. This one was exciting for Doc, personally – he loved any chance he could get to go exploring old historic sites. Drew preferred ancient ruins, herself, since they tended to have more mysticism, more power, but the combined expertise of the two of them together covered practically all of civilized human history.

She had come out of the lab room a little distracted, but when she heard news of the report, she found she could put her focus on the cryptids for now, and discuss what Dr. Bara had said to her with Doc once Zak had gone to sleep. There wasn’t any immediate danger, the paraneurologist had concluded, so she had time to bring it up.

She was apprehensive when she heard Doyle would be coming along, and gave him a stern warning not to get too rough too fast (remembering the fiasco with the owlman), staring him down with her best glare before pulling him into a crushing hug. He returned the gesture after an awkward hesitation, and Doyle ran off immediately to combat practice with his nephews, opting to skip out on the history lesson that Doc was clearly gearing up for.

The ship quieted down when Zak, Doyle, and the cryptids finally retired to bed in preparation for the trip. Even with the airship’s normal speed, a flight across half the globe still took time; Doc and Drew, in the cockpit, were also planning to grab a couple hours’ worth of sleep before they arrived in Wales. But that could come later; for now, the two were reclined in the cockpit, lights dimmed, blinking displays illuminating the room.

If there was a time, it would be now. Drew turned to her husband and got his attention; then, with the Pacific Ocean spreading out underneath them, she told him what the paraneurologist had concluded earlier that day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's doyle!!


	7. homo homini anguis est.

_Man._

_No, it had a better name for them, now. Homo sapiens and his brothers, erectus and neanderthalensis._

_It was impressed with the words it found at its tongue. They were specific; they were useful._

_Pursuit predator, meaning they hunted their prey. But they were by far more suited for endurance than speed, catching what their cousin canids and felids could not through sheer persistence, walking their prey to slow exhaustion before they sank their jagged rocks in to finish what they could not do with bare hands alone._

_What a cruel, sadistic way to hunt. It couldn’t help but be impressed._

_Omnivores, meaning they supplemented what they caught with what they gathered. Canines to shred. Incisors to cut. Molars to grind._

_Fire._

_Fire to cook, fire to roast. Fire to soften the food. Less time to chew meant more time to grow. Less time to chew meant more time to think._

_They grew. They thought._

_Opposable thumbs, the hallmark of their order. Erect posture, their genus. Increased cranial size, their species._

_With these they choked out all their siblings wherever they encountered them, as they spread their numbers across the earth._

_Monotypic taxon, a genus with only one species left._

_(Not that that was any reason to judge.)_

_It liked the words that they invented. They were good at naming things._

_Two hundred thousand passes of the earth around the sun. They invented many names for it._

_Those names, it did not bother to remember. They were names of fear, whispers of a monster that encircled the earth and bit its own tail. They were names of reverence, words for something beyond their mortal comprehension. They were names of hatred, for a callous god whose frivolous tempers would rend their tribes limb from limb for no apparent provocation. They were names of warning._

_If you encountered it and escaped unharmed, good fortune was upon you, for great and terrible evil had passed you by._

_It cared little for the morality of men._

_It was a great many years before they settled on a name for it. It caught on quickly for its brevity and succinctness, all the fear of millennia encapsulated in a hushed, single syllable. They whispered it amongst themselves when they thought it could not hear (though its eyes and ears stretched everywhere, and there was little it could not know – how pathetic their attempts at secrecy were). They cried that name when it came and answered their challenges, proved to them time and time again how futile their short lives were against its infinity. They gurgled that name in dying gasps, wailed it in their grief._

_But man was nothing if not persistent._

_They sought out the mysteries of the earth and tamed them to their usage, keeping captive prey and captive grains. Less time to hunt meant more time to think. They thought, and they grew, and they built, and they built, and they built._

_They built amazing things, things in such size and scope that they marred the surface of the earth, dug deep gashes in its side. They built wondrous things, things carved out of sandstone and lime that would not disappear for millennia after their architects died. They built horrific things, things that reworked the planet to their selfish ends, offerings to gods that didn’t exist._

_They screamed its name when it came to tear them down._

_It remembered the ground stained deep red with their blood, and still they screamed and screamed and screamed._

_It liked the name they gave him. Very eloquent, it thought._

_Kur._

_Evil incarnate, the destroyer, the end. Kur, the blackness of the world, the serpent that held their deities at bay, that bit the throat of benevolence and mercy and envenomed its blood with fury and hate._

_Kur, the scourge of the human race._

_Well, it thought, it was the scourge of a great many things._

_Humans always did have an issue with their ego. It relished in crushing its spine out as it begged for a mercy that didn’t exist._

_They had such good names for what it would do to them. It’d always liked their words._

_In their words, it would mar and maim and kill them._

_It’d devour, quell, break, extinguish, quash, thrash, and annihilate them._

_It’d shatter, lacerate, mutilate, execute, massacre, strangle, slaughter, destroy, erase, ravage, ruin, raze, wreck, waste, swallow, consume, abate, eradicate, obliterate, and end them._

_It’d cremate them in its orange flames, it’d incinerate them to ashes in the wind._

And the sheer, unabashed glee with which he bore that thought had Zak Saturday awake in a cold, dread sweat by the callous light of the waxing moon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not very graphic, but there are mentions of genocidal levels of human-slaughter, and there is a blood mention warning.
> 
> This is actually a re-upload; I realized it worked better if chapter 7 came first.


	8. The Medical Term is "Limbic Boogaloo"

The blue-orange maps of the MRI results sat heavy and queasy in Drew’s gut, tacked to one of the laboratory walls like an indictment. Beside her, Dr. David Bara slowly gathered his supplies, waiting for Drew to break the silence that hung over the room like a fog.

“I could give you a better diagnosis if you gave me more to work with,” the paraneurologist said, quietly.

Zak’s hippocampus was so bright it was practically glowing, little fireworks sparking off in the thalamus and amygdala. Damning him in neon orange, splattering the page like an ink spill.

Drew bit her lip. “Not a word to the other scientists?”

“Ever heard of a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’? I’m not about to run your boy through hell again just because of a hunch, Drew. An’ I don’t think it’d help anyone, least of all your boy there, if we act on just an assumption a’ what his future holds.”

“You’re a good man, David.” She uncrossed and crossed her arms again, struggling to find the words. “One week ago. He followed a lead down to Kur’s dead body and pulled a spear out of it. For lack of a more scientific way to put it, it gave him a life essence transfusion straight from the source.”

“I see,” Dr. Bara nodded. He walked to the wall with the results taped up, took one of them down to study it closer. Drew looked over his shoulder. “You still got that spear he pulled out?”

She shook her head. “He said it disappeared from where he left it in his room. We don’t know where it went.”

“Mm,” he said. “Well, I guess it’s fine. I think I got enough to give it a shot.”

Drew swallowed. “What’s your opinion, David?”

“Memory,” he said, tracing the limbic system with his thumb. “That’s what this says to me. Honest when you lot came to me about ‘weird dreams’ I thought you were trying to insult me. Dream interpretation’s a load a’ hooey, but this – this is…something.’

“Memory?”

“Something’s tickling the places responsible for it, see? And from what you’ve told me, it’s probably a few million-billion years of something. One reason people sleep is it gives their brains some time to sort their recollections through. I’d guess your son hasn’t been dreamin’ – he’s been remembering.”

He stopped to think for a moment, choosing his words carefully. Psychology, neurology – they could uncover answers about humanity like nearly nothing else, but those answers were often truths that weren’t easy to bear.

“We like to think, Drew,” he started at last, “we like to think there’s some essential essence that makes us ‘us.’ Like a soul, or spirit, or something like that.” He tried to smile reassuringly, but there wasn’t ever an easy way to put it. “The truth is, though – there ain’t. What we do have is a brain. One-point-four kilos of axons, dendrites, and electricity. That’s what makes up you, that’s what makes up me. An’ if something ever happens to you that permanently alters it? Well…”

He trailed off, coughed, and began again. “Whatever you end up turning out as, that’s it – you – forever.”

She could already guess the implications, but couldn’t stop the question that slipped out. “So what does that mean for Zak?”

Dr. Bara paused to gather the right words. He wasn’t a delicate man, he knew this, but at the least he could try.

“Best case…” he started. “Best case is, it all settles down on its own, you get Zak some art classes and he can paint you a historically accurate Tyrannosaurus.”

“And the worst case?”

Dr. Bara let out a breath. “Worst case is, when all the sparks die down and everythin’ is said an’ done…whatever comes out on the other side of that tunnel won’t be someone you can call ‘Zak’ anymore.”

 

* * *

 

The moon hung glut and nearly full like an eyeball in the sky, blurred behind the thick clouds that drifted across its empty white. The town around them lay deserted, lights out. The black hollows in the windows of the stone houses hid eyes, Zak thought. They were being watched, weren’t they? He couldn’t shake the feeling, somehow, a feeling that prickled the back of his neck.

Fisk cast him a wary gaze, eyes bright red and reflective in the dark.

Zak had tried to describe the dream to his brother. He had. But how could he find the words? How could he even begin to articulate a nightmare where he was no longer himself, but instead, a force of primeval darkness, everything he’d spent his life fighting against? How could he say that, for a brief moment after awakening, he’d wished he’d never taken the Naga’s bargain at all, and would rather have been left for dead?

Buyer’s remorse.

Something dark was gnawing on his soul, a dread. What if? What if he’d been right, that the Nagas were planning to resurrect their master? What if? What if he’d fallen for the trap they’d set, hook, line, and sinker? What if?

And _if so_ …then what? Months spent with the Secret Scientists on their tail. Tsul’Kalu chasing after him, the vivid visions of burning cities, wails of grief. Argost, the Nagas, and -

Even though everyone had tried to keep the numbers a secret from him, he knew that the death toll existed, for that year of strife where his life went to ruin.

But he _wasn’t_ Kur. He couldn’t be. After everything he’d been through to get rid of that name, that syllable that hung on his destiny like a parasite. He wanted to be rid of it. He wanted “Kur” – everything about “Kur” – to disappear. After everything that happened, hadn’t he finally earned the right to just be Zak Saturday, and nothing – no one – else?

So he refused it. Whatever this was supposed to be, he didn’t want it. He wouldn’t, wouldn’t, wouldn’t. No matter what it took, no matter what the cost, there was no way he could accept that he’d had the carpet whisked out from under his feet again. Because the cost of that admission was too great, because he couldn’t lose everything and everyone for the second time.

So in the end, he’d had nothing to say.

His parents had been strange since this morning, too. Like they were hiding some secret between themselves, afraid to approach him. The silence felt the same as his own, but what secret could they be keeping mum about that would call for all those short, awkward pauses, the words that died before they left his parents’ throats?

Even if it ate at him, it wasn’t like Zak was in any position to confront them. Not when he was hiding his own mysteries. If he tore off their cover, he felt like he’d be bringing his own shadows to light.

He was only trailing behind the group by a couple feet, but he’d never felt so far away.

Doyle, on the other hand, hiding nothing at all, continued brashly and obliviously on as the vanguard, snarking on his surroundings incessantly, a welcome distraction from the dark cloud plaguing the rest of the family.

“This place looks like it was evacuated,” Doyle said, wrinkling his nose. It really did – child’s toys were left in the street where they fell, mail sat unopened in mailboxes, fluttering in the breeze. “The buildings here give me the creeps.”

“They’re just old,” Doc replied, taking the lead with the light of his glove.

“Old people give me the creeps, too,” Doyle replied. Zak managed a weak smile at that.

Doc rolled his eyes and pretended not to notice the retort, choosing instead to focus on the display of the holo-map he’d pulled up over his wrist.

“The mayor said that you can hear howling coming from the marshes right outside the castle.” Drew was peering over his shoulder, scrolling the map with her finger. “Local legends have always said they were haunted.”

”The closest match to the mayor’s description we can find in the cryptopedia is the gwyllgi. Location matches, it’s canid, measures to about the size of a horse, has glowing eyes.” Doc said. “The problem is that the behavior doesn’t match up. Gwyllgi are solitary. The legends call them ‘omens of death,’ but no one’s ever reported an _attack_ before.”

“More of the ‘black cat crossing your path’ omen of death than the actual instigator,” Drew finished.

“Maybe something’s wigging them out?” Zak piped up from the back. “Like, new land development? We’ve seen that before.”

“Could be,” said his dad, “though if that’s what’s happening, it’s illegal. This whole area’s a historical site. The laws for building new property are so strict that most companies won’t even bother, and the ones that do tend to care about where and how they’re building.”

“Like that’s ever stopped anyone,” Doyle remarked.

There wasn’t much they could say to that. As bitter as it was to admit it, he had a point.

The buildings became plainer as they travelled out of the tourist area into residential districts. Eventually, those gave way to utility buildings, and, finally, there was nothing but marshland before them, trees rattling as their branches clanged off each other in the breeze, the only sound to be heard for miles and miles.

A shiver ran down Zak’s spine as they crossed the threshold out of town.

Something felt very off about the whole thing. It couldn’t just be the dark and the damp – he had no problems adventuring through the dark, in biospheres more dangerous than this. Just that – no matter how he tried to figure out the logic behind the attacks – somehow, it felt like he was missing some piece of the puzzle. He looked up to his brother, and the furrowed look of confusion evident on his face told Zak that Fisk thought so, too.

Regardless, the two of them said nothing, and so into the marshes they marched, path lit by the light of the moon. The moonlight blurred the scenery, dampened it, drove dark shadows out dancing where they shouldn’t be, fogged the sound of their feet on the gravel path that was slowly giving way to dirt.

Zak couldn’t shake the feeling of eyes on them, though when he looked back there was nothing to see.

_Whatever it is, it’s close._

He ignored the words that flitted into his head like someone had whispered them in his ear. He forgot them with a shake of his head, crowded them out.

The adults had begun to discuss the possibilities in quiet voices, a back-and-forth of the outlandish and mundane. How to deal with, how to fight if fighting became necessary. Keep Zak out of harm’s way – no, he can handle himself – Zak wasn’t paying too much mind.

Fisk’s hackles had raised up above his neck, and he’d begun swinging his eyes warily around the marsh, darting between the shadows of the scrub and trees and the dark pools between folds of grassy hill. A piercing luminescent red gaze, eyes almost glowing with the reflection from the lanterns the Saturdays held up. Out of all of them, he had the best night vision, even when Doc had his equipment to help him out. His hearing was more sensitive, too, and his instincts, ever since he’d honed them during the Kur madness, had been a reliable skill ever since – bordering on precognitive. The family had begun to count on him to be the first to raise an alarm, and if he hadn’t given the signal yet, then that meant that they must be safe for the time being. Still…

Zak squeezed his arm. They shared a look, both sure.

Something was lurking out there in the marsh.

”Zak’s already almost sixteen. You know, by that age, I was already gatecrashing triad bunkers in Hong Kong. You can’t keep treating him like a kid.”

”He IS a kid,” Drew said. “A fifteen-year-old should only be worrying about SATs and college applications, not putting his life on the line.”

”Do I get a say in this?” Zak asked, but the adults didn’t seem to hear him.

”Weren’t you raised in a Tibetan monastery?”

”I still took my SATs.”

”How…” Doyle shook his head. “The point is, he’s not always going to have you guys around to coddle him. You’re going to have to let him grow up at some point.”

”We’re his parents,” Doc said. “We appreciate your concern for him, but we fully intend to be with him every step of the way. That’s what family is about.”

There was a finality in his voice that made it clear that the argument was over. Doyle bit his cheek and sulked.

Zak stayed quiet.

”Doyle,” Drew said, in a softer tone, “You know that we’re your family, too.”

But before Doyle could work up some kind of response to that, Fisk yelped, and the family turned to look behind them.

The first howl lilted up over the trees, a lonely and baleful sound that chilled them to the bone. Instinctively, the group drew tight, Fiskerton stepping out in front of Zak, Doc and Drew drawing their glove and sword, Doyle’s stance widening, Zon and Komodo hissing into the black night.

There was another howl to answer the first. Then another, and another. Five. Six.

Seven, eight. Eight pairs of green glowing dots peeking out over the crests of the hills. Surrounding them. Closing in. Flaming eyes, the cryptopedia had said. An omen of death.

A thick cloud drifted over the moon, snuffing out what little light was illuminating the countryside. And in that moment, their technology sparked, fizzled, and died, leaving them stranded in the dark.

In that moment, the gwyllgi were upon them.

Time moved in double and half, visibility limited to the sickly green glow, flashes of white teeth, snarls and growls, yelling and screeching. Claws and slobber, metal and fire. The gwyllgi were fearless, ruthless, a well-coordinated pack, fangs scrabbling with bright blue sparks against the flat of Drew’s blade, the curve of Doc’s gauntlet. Sickly and gaunt, voracious and wild, and enormous. Each one, alone, would be more than a match for Fiskerton’s strength; the only advantage the family had was that they, too, were a well-coordinated team.

It was happening so fast Zak barely even had time to think. Still, something was throbbing in his head - there was something wrong, something wrong…

When Zak closed his eyes he could see the gwyllgi like they were _supposed_ to be. Proud and regal, lonely and brave. This – these starving, hungry wraiths, this mindless wrath, this misplaced, reasonless fury – this was not –

His skull felt like it was pulsing. Familiar but painful. He didn’t want…

If he could just reach out and touch one then maybe -

Fisk screeched and pulled him back out of the snapping, snarling maw just in time, hot breath and saliva against his fingertips. Something in him bubbled uneasily, tried to break through the shell of his self-control. Magma, he thought, lava. If he puked it’d be bright orange-yellow. Would melt a hole through the ground straight to the core of the earth.

_Orange. Yellow. Red. What’s wrong with this picture?_

Zak cried out in a strangled tone and he was almost afraid he’d tear himself open with the force of it. “Their eyes! Mom, their – “

The snap of jaws mere inches from his face, the hot breath and slobber on his skin, and Fisk’s furious, worried shriek drowned him out.

”Gwyllgi aren’t supposed to be able to short electricity,” Doc yelled, frustrated, tossing one hound into another.

”Who would have thought,” Doyle remarked with a snide tone as he sidestepped a pounce with Zon’s help, “that the unexplained magical dog-beasts from hell would be using weird, mystical powers.”

”Do you have to do that to everything I say?”

Doyle shrugged. “Yeah, probably.”

”Doc’s right, though,” Drew said, though, lost in thought, it came out too quiet for anyone to hear. “And this behavior is totally atypical…”

A gwyllgi came at her and she parried it, its teeth sending up big white-blue sparks as they dragged down the flat of her blade. For all the banter, the family was losing this fight – in the dark and without electronics, the gwyllgi had the clear advantage. The Saturday family circle grew tighter and tighter, and they were pushed into lower and lower ground, until Doc’s boot sinking almost to his knee in wet mud startled him and one of the hellhounds would have torn his throat out if Komodo hadn’t come out of nowhere to clamp his jaws around its front ankle and topple it with its own momentum.

”We can’t keep up like this,” Doc said. “The terrain is to disadvantageous. We have to fall back.”

”But the town is in the other direction,” Drew said. “One way or another we’re going to have to fight our way through.”

”I heard ‘flash grenades,’” Doyle volunteered. “You guys said ‘Doyle, use your flash grenades and let’s all make a run for it,’ right?”

”That,” Doc grunted, grudgingly, “would be a good idea. Thanks.”

”Though, just so we’re clear – you’re paying for them.”

”What? I never - “

Before he could finish his thought, four loud bangs and an intensely bright light flashed for a brief, dazzling moment. The gwyllgi, with night-vision eyes, let out whimpers and shrieks, some falling dazed to the ground, and the Saturdays took the reprieve to beat it out as fast as they could towards the few small lights of the town just over the hill.

Somehow, the flashbangs seemed to have driven the gwyllgi off, because even after its effects should have worn off the Saturdays weren’t being pursued any further. They slowed down just outside town, sweaty and grimy and out of breath, their systems rebooting as they drew near civilization.

It was still too dark to see anything except by the light of the few systems they were getting working again.

”It just doesn’t make sense,” Drew mumbled out loud. “They’re territorial. Solitary. That attack was way too coordinated! And using the terrain to their advantage? These aren’t creatures that consider that sort of thing!”

”Cryptopedia’s back online,” Doc said. “Maybe we missed something.”

The holographic display came up, bathing them all in a faint greenish light.

”That’s definitely what we saw out there,” Doyle confirmed.

But Drew wasn’t convinced. There was something wrong, if only she could put her finger on it –

What had Zak been trying to say? While they were fighting, words drowned out by the snarls of the gwyllgi like they were trying to shut him up on purpose. Their eyes. “Their eyes…”

Drew’s widened. She stepped back and frantically searched the party, head swiveling left and right because no, no, no, it couldn’t be true, he couldn’t –

”Drew?” Doc asked.

”Their eyes are supposed to be red,” Drew said, panicking. “Not green. _Red._ Doc…”

”Oh,” Doc said. “Oh no.”

”Where’s Zak?” Drew yelled. The hills echoed her question back to her, a fading repeat like the darkness itself was mocking her.

”Where’s Zak?” It went, getting further and further away. “Where’s Zak? Where’s Zak?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big dogs attack. Brain talk. IDK. I'm back also, hi!


	9. Easter Even

The view from the top of the Empire State building paired well with glass of Zinfandel and a platter of aged gouda infused with sun-dried jalapeños (artisan and imported from the city in South Holland itself). The Louvre museum, and the rest of France sprawling underneath them, went excellent with the delicate fragrances of Merlot and lamb grilled extra rare. His own mansion, Weird World, was best enjoyed with a generous cup of well-aged Cabernet Sauvignon a hearty slab of prime beef cooked chateaubriand.

And Castle Gwylnos?

Well, that, Argost decided, paired very well with a flute of Pinot Grigio, and a silver plate covered in oysters and roe.

A light meal, perhaps, but this was merely the _hors d’oeuvres_ to a main course that would be many times more delectable.

Cage-free, organic, raised with care, aged for fifteen years.

Argost didn’t need to turn around to see them – the three gwyllgwi standing guard around the pair gave Argost the best view in the castle.

Zak’s face was shoved against the stonework of the ramparts, arms bound behind his back at a painful angle, with Munya’s clawed foot keeping him pinned to the ground. His furred “brother” – Argost scoffed at the sentiment – was bound by his side, spider webs tying his arms to his body and ankles to each other, one thick wad acting as a gag to keep him from making any noise louder than a grunt.

The last thing Argost wanted was for his barbaric monkey screams to interrupt his moment.

“Greetings and _bienvenue_ , dear Saturday. My goodness, but it’s been an age and a half, hasn’t it?”

“Argost,” Zak growled, and the way he set it sent tingles up Argost’s spine. Oh, if he had to give the Saturday boy anything, it would be that he knew exactly how to play into a dramatic moment. His last words, whatever they might be tonight, would likely be just as satisfying as his current performance. …Well, begging for his own life wouldn’t be so bad, either.

“I should have known it was you the moment I heard there was a castle involved.”

“Oh, but you _didn’t_. Why was that, I wonder?”

There was no reply from the boy, just the sound of his teeth grinding together. It wasn’t hard to extrapolate what he wanted to say – that Argost had been disseminated from reality, that it was impossible that Argost could be sitting here, alive and well, when Zak had seen with his own eyes the end of Argost’s existence.

“My _dear boy_ ,” Argost said, every word dripping with a gleeful malice. “If you thought that simply being rent from the fabric of space-time itself was enough to put me down…”

He drew up to his full height, and, ah, there was that look of fear on Zak’s face he had been hoping to inspire. This new body was young and supple, stretched easily to the nine feet that a yeti ought to be, no longer stooped by decades of hunching over to speak with humans at their pitiable eye level.

He turned to grin at Zak, fangs and snarl free of his usual mask, silhouetted by the light of the waxing moon.

 

 

“Then I am _wounded_ by your lack of _faith_.”

 

* * *

 

Alright, so, pros and cons of the situation. Pros: they weren’t dead yet. They’d faced Argost before; they’d _survived_ Argost before. And Fisk was here with him.

Now for the cons.

One, Argost was massive. Two, he had Munya with him, and three gwyllgi, and some orange humanoid cryptid Zak vaguely remembered seeing in the cryptopedia, making this, effectively, a six-on-two fight. Three, Argost had his powers. Four, Zak didn’t.

And five, one of those _damn headaches_ was back, pounding in his skull, stabbing behind his eyes with every word from Argost’s mouth.

…On a scale from one to screwed, Zak estimated their position as roughly around the “very, very” mark.

His only hope –

“You’re thinking you’ll stall for time until your precious little family gets here, aren’t you?”

Zak was yanked into the air by Argost’s clawed hand on his collar, brought close to those sharp white teeth. The sudden movement sent a wave of nausea through him, and it took all his strength not to vomit right onto Argost’s face. Even if it would have been satisfying,

“I think you fail to understand the full gravity of the situation, _boy_. This isn’t a sitcom showdown, where the villain gets driven away and you get to live to fight another day. _This is already my complete victory_.”

“What…what do you mean?” Damnit, if only it didn’t hurt to think –

“Come now, little Saturday, there’s a limit on how disappointing one _mere mortal_ can be.” His leery grin turned manic, his grip on Zak’s shirt tightening. Fiskerton made a muffled scream, trying desperately to move his bound body over to where Zak was, but Munya slammed him into the ground before he could do anything.

Argost leaned closer, hot breath wild and animalistic against Zak’s throat. “What is there stopping me from simply stamping out the human race?”

He waited until the weight of that question sank in, until the fiery defiance in Zak’s eyes changed to an honest fear. A terrible expression of anguish and despair; how dearly Argost had hoped to see it.

He gently set Zak back down on his feet, dusted off his shoulder with the back of his hand. He ripped through Munya’s spiderwebs binding Zak’s wrists together with a swipe of his claws, careful not to injure the flesh below. Even though he was freed, Zak found himself standing dumbly in place.

What _was_ stopping Argost from making good on every evil intention he’d ever had since the moment the Kur stone was discovered?

Argost had merely folded his hands behind his back, smugly watching Zak’s expression as his brain worked its way through every implication.

Argost still had his powers. He still had all his memories, and he obviously knew that Zak hadn’t returned with his. How long had Argost been revived for? In all that time, how far along could his planning have gone?

If…if at any time, he could have amassed his cryptid army, and set it loose upon the world, but instead, he was here, he’d come here specifically to bring Zak to the castle, to gloat, to let him live…

The yeti’s eyes glinted cold and triumphant and pitiless in the light of the moon. There would be no mercy to be found there, no salvation to be had.

Argost was going to kill him

This – all of this – was nothing more than a sideshow before the main event. Oh, Argost was brilliant, he was cunning and clever and cutthroat, but he was also petty and vengeful in equal measure.

When the war on humanity started again, there was no guarantee Argost would be there in person to squeeze the life out of the Saturdays that had vexed him for so long. There would simply be too much going on at any given time, too many forces to direct and capitols to crush; it was just unreasonable to think he’d be able to exact remuneration for his personal grudge by his own hands once everything had been set in motion. But Argost wasn’t a fool; he’d never do something so stupid as give away his presence if there was any chance he could lose as a result.

There just wasn’t any way he _could_ lose.

Even if Zak managed to escape with his family somehow, Argost would simply snap his fingers and unleash hell on earth once more, and no one would have enough time to prepare for it. And even if they somehow incapacitated Argost – even if they killed him first – if being disintegrated down to the subatomic level wasn’t enough to get rid of him, then nothing they did would be.

He’d…won.

And the person who’d gotten rid of the only thing that could have stood in Argost’s way was none other than Zak himself, two years ago, when he’d gone down into that room alone, knowing full well what Argost’s intent had been.

_Stupid, stupid, stupid._

The grin Argost gave him when he looked up was all the confirmation that he needed.

When Argost finally spoke, breaking the silence between them, it was in a voice full of kindness, a mockery of sympathy. It was a gloat, plain and simple, savoring a victory hard-earned.

“It’s been a good life, hasn’t it? Parents who cared for you, friends who would stare down an apocalypse for your sake?”

“Shut up,” Zak hissed. Both to Argost and to the ringing in his ears, the buzzing in his skull.

“If you look over the parapets right now, you can see your family coming up the hill. How relieved they’ll be to see their precious son alive and well, hm?”

He should be terrified right now, but instead, something inside him was _furious_. It took every ounce of concentration not to simply leap onto Argost’s body right now, not to choke the light out of Argost’s eyes, for ever daring to –

Daring to –

“Munya, if you would…”

A thick, blunt impact hit his back, and before Zak could react he was pulled back into Munya’s crushing grip by a spider thread, held up off the ground by his waist. No matter how hard he struggled, he couldn’t break free; Munya’s skin, armored and hard, deflected all his weak human blows.

Fisk, too, was slung over Munya’s other shoulder, wriggling and writhing but ultimately unable to break free, either. With Argost taking the lead, Munya and the other orange cryptid followed him into one of the turrets on the side of the ramparts and down the stairs, plunging them into inky black.

“Where are we going?” Zak asked, hands curled up into tight fists, though he already knew the answer.

“Your family is practically at our door. And we, the actors of this _tragédie_ , must be in our places when the curtains rise.”

 

* * *

 

Zak understood once his feet touched the ground, what Argost had meant by “tragedy.”

“No,” he said, trying to keep himself together. “No, you can’t!”

Fisk had been placed on the other side of the castle’s courtyard, opposite Zak’s position. His eyes were wide, panicked, darting nervously from wall to wall, from Argost and Munya to the gwyllgi – a full pack  - skulking around the edges of the garden, standing guard with fangs bared. He hadn’t figured it out, yet, what this setup was all about, but Zak had.

Argost’s grin only widened. Yes, _this_ was the way things were always meant to be; those foolish humans left only to scream and cry and curse him, powerless against him. This was what he had always wanted, what he had dedicated his _life_ to – finally, he was the apex, the top of the food chain, the end of the line.

Too bad this moment couldn’t last forever.

“You will find there is very little I cannot do anymore, boy.”  

He came to stand over where Fiskerton lay, causing the Lemurian to flinch back from him. How funny. Argost couldn’t help the sneer that came to his face.

“The last of the Lemurians. I’ll be honest with you, dear beast, I was worried you would come to stand in my way at the last moment with some ridiculous _deus ex machina_. But in the end, you’re nothing more than an animal, aren’t you? Sweet thing.”

He reached into the darkness of his cape and pulled from its depths the instrument of his apotheosis.

The Fang glistened with a cruel luster as Argost twirled it in his hands. Fisk nearly yelled into his gag at the sight of it, desperately trying to inch away. He knew what it would do to him – the loss of control, the frenzy, the _pain_ – no, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t, he had to keep Zak safe –

But Argost was having none of that.

His powers jumped to life with a crackle, sparking green all up his eyes and down the shaft of the Fang right into Fiskerton’s brain. And even behind the gag Fisk screamed, fighting against the intrusion with every ounce of willpower he had.

“Stop!” Zak screamed, grabbing the claw at his waist and rushing forward. Moved by adrenaline and desperation more than anything, he closed the distance faster than he ever could have otherwise, but before he could reach the two and disrupt them, Munya caught him with another spiderweb and yanked him backwards into the dirt, knocking all the breath out of him.

Glaring behind him the moment he recovered some of his breath, he severed the silk with a sweep of his claw. But then Munya’s body was on him, muscle and armor, wrenching his arm behind him, pinning him facedown into the grass that left little cuts on his cheeks, forcing him to watch Fiskerton writhe.

Except Fiskerton’s struggles had taken on a different form, now, no longer the agony of resistance, but a wild and crazed thrashing that slowly worked Munya’s spider threads off. With each jerk of his limbs, the threads came looser and looser, until, finally, they had sloughed off to the point where Fisk could stand, panting and growling, to face the yeti.

And then he turned, and the green sparking off his eyes told Zak he was lost.

Again, that alien _fury_ was burning in his chest, searing through his heart and bone. He felt like he could spit fire, like if he bared his fangs and roared it’d come boiling up his throat.

“Get out of his head,” Zak growled, though what he really meant was _how insolent_ , how _dare_ he –

But Argost only laughed, putting on a gleeful falsetto. “Make me,” he taunted, with a small flourish of the Fang, and Zak saw images of that body breaking beneath him.

He was pulled to his feet faster than his mind could catch up with it and shoved roughly forward into the ring. Fiskerton, eyes crackling with energy, fists curling and uncurling, foam frothing at the edges of his mouth – no, Zak refused to let it end here. Fisk was in there, somewhere, and he didn’t care how much it might amuse the yeti for him to spout those clichéd lines. That was his _brother_ , someone he’d gladly lay down his life for.

Argost knew, and was counting on that, when he sent Fiskerton lunging forward.

Fisk hit like a truck, all muscle and bone, and even though Zak had blocked the blow with the shaft of the claw it still sent him skidding backwards on the dirt. There was hardly any time to react before the next blow came, Fiskerton pouncing on the empty air where Zak used to be.

Zak knew Fiskerton’s movements, and he was running on the adrenaline high of his life, but he knew this wasn’t a battle he could win. Fiskerton out-powered him, out-sped him, and had far more endurance than Zak did, even without the Monday-Kur’s frenzy. His family was coming soon. Zak just had to last until then. Stay alive, wake Fiskerton up, escape. No matter how futile that might be, no matter how impossible, he wouldn’t let himself lose Fisk again, and he couldn’t afford to lose.

Fiskerton roared and lunged at him again, and Zak was only able to escape by a hair’s breadth, twisting to the side, feeling the rush of wind Fisk left in his wake.

“Fisk,” Zak yelled, “fight it off! You know how to do it, I know you do! You don’t want this!”

“The Lemurian can’t hear you right now, I’m afraid,” Argost laughed. “Can you, pet?”

Fiskerton roared in response and lunged again, this time catching Zak by the shaft of the claw and pinning him to the ground. Just inches above Zak’s face, jaws snapping open and shut just over his eyes.

 _I’m sorry_ , Zak thought.

He placed a foot on Fisk’s stomach and kicked upwards as hard as he could, flipping Fisk off his body and maneuvering himself back to his feet. If he couldn’t reach Fiskerton through words, then all he had to do was knock him out until his family got there and they could all escape together. That couldn’t be so hard, right?

Except there wasn’t an opportunity to even try, not when Fiskerton’s fists were coming at him from all sides, when the only role he could play at all was a defensive one. There was no opportunity for counterattack, no blind spot to attack him from. Zak was quickly growing tired, his reflexes dulling, his limbs starting to shake.

No human could have been expected to keep up with this assault; it was already impressive Zak had lasted as long as he did.

Fisk finally managed to hook him in the stomach, under the ribs, with a blow from his fist, and Zak crumpled around it, falling to the ground. Big hands grabbed him around the shoulders and threw him into the ground; Zak went sprawling on his back, pain screaming from every inch of his body. Wrists bruised where Munya had grabbed them, arms aching from Fisk’s throw, his spine aching, his legs sore, and that pounding in his head worse than it’d ever been.

Exhausted, he could do nothing but lie on the ground and breathe. Through the black spots in his vision he could see Fiskerton retreating slightly, and through the buzzing in his ears he could vaguely hear Argost giving the order – wait until the signal, then give Zak the death blow, for everyone to see.

Tears welled up in the corners of Zak’s eyes, his fists clenching uselessly in the dirt. Was this how it was all going to end? No, it couldn’t be. He couldn’t accept it. But whether he accepted it or not, his vision was fading and going black.

And still that fire _burned_. So hot that it could cremate him, so hot that it could melt him down and leave no trace, clothes, flesh, bones and all.

 

* * *

 

A scraping sound made Argost turn, and there he saw Zak, pulling his battered body to its feet.

A glutton for punishment, wasn’t he? Still, Argost didn’t dislike that aspect of him. Toys were no fun if they broke too easily, after all; as well as Zak had done to last for as long as he did, it was still disappointing that it’d been over so quickly.

A cloud had drifted over the moon, plunging them all into the darkness, but all present except the human were equipped with eyes that could see in low light.

Zak swayed on his feet, only once, before his stance became steady, the Claw still grasped in one of his hands. With the other, he reached up to wipe the dirt out of his eyes.

Yes, he wouldn’t be a Saturday if he were not so frustratingly persistent. The Fang jumped back to life and Fiskerton roared, falling to all fours, muscles tightening.

“You should have stayed down, boy,” Argost jeered, and Fiskerton pounced, three-hundred and forty pounds of muscle and teeth and fury.

Unsurprisingly, Zak made no move to get out of the way. What was surprising, however, was what he did instead.

When he raised the Claw, Argost thought he’d been moving to block the blow, but, instead, deftly, he’d turned it around in his hands until he held it ready in reverse, the head at the end pointing forward.

In the split second before the two collided – not a moment sooner and not a moment too late – he struck, hooking the butt end of the claw into Fiskerton’s open mouth and pivoting, driving all Fiskerton’s momentum and weight crashing into the ground headfirst.

Quite frankly, it left everyone speechless. Cold and simple, it’d turned the tables in an instant. Without even hesitating, Zak then brought his foot down on Fiskerton’s throat, pressing into it even as Fiskerton thrashed for breath, until those wild spasms became small twitches, and then nothing.

The Lemurian was still breathing, after Zak stepped off him, but only _just_.

Argost was distinctly reminded of a viper’s strike. A cold shiver ran down his spine.

Still, this was _his_ stage, and this was _his_ moment, and heavens be damned if he was about to let this upstart _brat_ steal the show from him again.

“My, my, little Saturday, I had no idea you were capable of such _cruelty –_ “

“ _Quiet_ ,” Zak interrupted.

The yeti was taken aback. He snarled. “My boy, you seem to forget the position you’re in – “

“ _Is there a part of ‘quiet’ that you don’t understand?_ ”

He didn’t raise his voice at all, but he didn’t need to; the venom dripping off every syllable stopped Argost in his tracks all on its own. The one who glared up at him was not the same person as the boy who had defied him earlier.

 _This_ , whatever it was, was something far, far more ancient than the Saturday boy ever was. He took a step forward and, moved by a primal instinct Argost didn’t understand, he and Munya and all the rest took a step back. Danger, danger, danger.

“ _The worm is given a thorn and thinks itself a serpent. There is bravery, and then there is arrogance, and then there is impudence, yeti._ ”

A fire was spreading from the Saturday’s eyes, wreathing his entire body. Suddenly finding himself, Argost sent his power out to the gwyllgi that had been keeping watch, but found he was unable to compel them to act. One by one those connections sizzled and snapped.

The ancient _thing_ inside Zak’s body was grinning now, cruel and sadistic, each step forward causing the crowd to shrink back against the walls.

It couldn’t be. But it had to be. Even though every record had said the Saturday had lost his powers, here was that familiar orange flame gathering before his eyes.

The deathworms Argost had called in underground, the small armies they were bringing in their tunnels – backups, because he’d had no intention of letting the Saturdays live – his connection with them was severed one by one.

Argost suddenly found himself _very_ alone.

And without the voices crowding around his own thoughts, he was able to recognize that fear within him, give a name to the being that was slowly stepping towards him. He suddenly found that he knew exactly who – _what_ it was that stood before him, just as suddenly as he found he knew what a horrible mistake he’d made, to push the boy this far.

“You’re Kur,” Argost breathed. His back hit the wall; he couldn’t tear his eyes away.

The Serpent didn’t even need to acknowledge it. They both already knew it was true.

It glanced around the courtyard using Zak’s eyes, slowly taking in every assembled beast that was held at bay by its presence.

“ _I will give you a choice. An eye for an eye. Your companions are here; I will give you a slow death at their hands._ ”

Argost swallowed. “And my other option?”

Kur grinned. “ _A swift death by mine._ ”

…No.

No!

What was this? Acting so pathetic in front of nothing more than a child. He was Vincent Vladislav Argost! He’d fought for _decades_ for the world that should have been his birthright! And now he was being expected to simply let all his hard work come to an end at the hands of someone who’d shown up to the party _late_?

He roared and lunged, intending to crush all the life from those eyes in one blow. Kur didn’t even flinch, standing firm with that mocking grin plastered all over Zak’s features. He didn’t need to even move; before Argost could even reach it, he was yanked back by his cape, sent crashing to the ground.

“ _It seems they don’t want you to do something that foolish_ ,” Kur commented, releasing, momentarily, the orange fire from Munya and the Xing-Xing’s eyes.

Argost growled, mind racing.

“ _Are you dissatisfied with my ruling?_ ” The smile dropped instantly, became cold disdain. “ _Pitiful. You cast aside your nature to live amongst the humans; you pandered to their interests until you become the most popular of their kind. An entire lifetime spent flattering the race you wanted to rule, and you still harbored dreams of ruling them?_ ”

It laughed, humorless.

“ _You don’t have followers, you have fans. You don’t have power, you have bravado. And even if you’ve managed to hide yourself away from me, you are still one of **mine**. I have judged you, yeti. The verdict is the end to your miserable condition. Watch carefully: **this** is power. Engrave it into your soul._ ”

And then Argost felt it, that burning pressure against his mind, that seized both his underlings, all the gwyllgi, that blazed itself across the world. It was glorious as it was terrible, breathtaking and inexorable, ancient and primordial, a fury that could devour the entire world, a force of nature contained in a single point.

The gwyllgi had pinned the yeti down, the other two held back by the same primal fear that had invaded Argost’s heart. Kur raised the Claw above its head, blunt end down, a wicked and gleeful smile wrought on Zak’s face.

“ _Let’s meet again in your next life; there, do not make the same mistakes._ ”

And it brought the weapon down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter gets pretty violent. lots of mentions of death.
> 
> argost's new body is based off a bear because a disproportionate number of "yeti" fur samples are bears. Also because it's way more intimidating than pig-gorilla-man.


	10. ENTR'ACTE

The seismometer sat ticking innocently in the corner, like it hadn’t just spit out the least comprehensible data ever. Even though Cheechoo had done everything short of dismantle it to make sure it wasn’t broken (and it wasn’t), the fact remained that, only a couple hours ago, it had decided to sound the earthquake alarm, effectively waking Cheechoo up with a panic attack.

But there was no earthquake, and certainly not one on the scale that the seismometer had reported.

A nine-point-eight on the Richter scale, something that ought to bring untold disaster, but when Cheechoo poked his head out of the observatory he’d been holed up in, the village below him was completely untouched, quiet in the dead of night.

If his devices weren’t broken, then he could rule out a misprint. These were top-of-the-line machines – he should know, he invented them himself.

Not only that, but the data from all his other devices reported the same, even the ones from halfway across the globe. His phone had been ringing all morning with calls from those who had bought and employed his seismogram – the numbers varied from point-zero to point-nine, but for a brief couple seconds, on paper, a calamity of epic proportions had erupted from every pore of the earth.

 _What an absolute mystery_.

It seemed only the instruments with Cheechoo’s level of sensitivity had reported on anything at all. Was it a fault with the machinery, or some greater mystery hovering overhead?

Maybe it was just seeing the number 9.8 flash on his phone screen, or maybe it was just the rude awakening, but something in his gut felt queasy about the whole affair. Still…if there hadn’t actually been a natural disaster of epic and untold proportions just now, then there was still work to do.

He’d have to pretend it was a misprint until he had some more free time. Even though, while he had no evidence to back it up, his gut feeling told him that, even in their limited way of expressing it, the seismometers had been right.

 

* * *

 

Pochi hadn’t stopped barking all night. This fact was only aggravated by the fact that Pochi’s barking sounded much more like a tiger’s roaring, and that her clawing at the door left deep gouge marks in it from tiger claws, and also that Pochi was currently inhabiting the body of a tiger.

Dr. Mizuki had eventually grown exasperated and had to tie her up outside, something he’d immediately regretted when she’d started whining and clawing at the door from the _other_ side. And Talu Mizuki was a patient man, but, then, Pochi was also usually so much better behaved, and, frankly, the whole situation was simply incomprehensible.

And besides that, he just felt bad for the poor beast. Sighing, and leaving his computer to compile data for a few hours, he pushed aside the enormous wooden door and stepped outside.

Pochi was crying miserably against the rock face outside the cave, trembling into Mizuki’s touch. He sighed, untying her heavy-duty rope and leading her back inside.

“<What am I going to do with you?>” He asked her in Japanese. She seemed to have calmed down, now, or at the very least exhausted herself, collapsing on her bed next to his own and huffing into the soft material.

She’d been spooked by something, obviously, but the problem was Mizuki had no idea what it could have been. And he was as superstitious as the next Japanese person; he’d entertained the idea that some ghost or monster had been enraged by their decision to move in, except they’d already been living in this cave for more than two years and there weren’t particularly any local legends surrounding the area.

Still, he thought, maybe they should trek down to the local land god's shrine and make an offering once it got dark again and there wouldn’t be human visitors there. There wasn’t exactly any use worrying about it now – he’d just pulled an all-nighter and he was exhausted.

He’d almost snapped again when he looked back and saw that his dog had climbed onto his bed, but then decided against it, merely rubbing the bridge of his nose, sighing, and climbing in after her.

The visage of Dr. Bara flitted through his mind. Shortly after Mizuki was inducted into the Secret Scientists, the Australian had all but assaulted him, begging to use him as a case study. He’d said something about recent research finding evidence that memory might not necessarily be stored in the brain, but Mizuki had found his demeanor uncomfortable and not just a little bit intimidating, so he’d ended up turning the neurologist away.

Maybe that had been the wrong choice.

He wasn’t usually this irate, especially where his dearest companion was concerned. As he ran his hand through her fur, he tried to calm his own heart.

A few hours ago, when all this panic had begun, he’d felt it too; a dark shiver in his heart, his body reacting to something his brain didn’t understand. He glared out the corner of his eye – fully capable of seeing in the dark, he’d discovered – at his work station, still softly whirring in the corner, small lights still blinking on and off.

He’d practically recreated the device already, everything but the physical model. But even that wouldn’t take too long to make, since his new position as one of the Secret Scientists afforded him both funding and the necessary connections for creating even the most specialized of parts. No, the problem was…

Whose body could he even use? It was probably possible to get the clearing to grow one from scratch without a brain to begin with, but that was ethically ambiguous at best, and probably a few more years of research besides. Maybe he could find someone who’d donated their body to science? But he had no idea if his device would work on cadavers, and he wasn’t exactly excited at the prospect of being the test subject for that.

…But no, those were all excuses. He knew that, especially with the support network he had now, a solution could be found within a few years.

He was putting it off because he no longer had any real desire to return to humanity, was the truth of it. He’d gotten used to his body, he’d made himself a cozy home, and he regularly met with the other Secret Scientists and their associates. Honestly, he had everything he could want – good friends, good food, and a means of helping the world like he’d always intended to do. And, on top of that, he was nine feet tall, incredibly strong and agile, and owned a pet tiger. Since everyone that really mattered to him accepted him, terrifying hibagon body and all, he’d never felt the pressure to go back to being an old man with weak shoulders and age spots all over his face.

But when Pochi had started barking he’d been seized with such an impulse to join her that it had terrified him. He’d thought – all this time – he’d maintained for so long that he was _not_ the beast whose body he had come to own, that he was something above and beyond that. Now that he realized his complacency with his position, he’d become scared that the line had blurred. What if it was already too late to go back?

He must begin preparations to return to a human body at once.

Though fitfully and uneasily, he managed to calm himself enough to sleep. Strange images fluttered through the black of his dreams.

 

* * *

 

Deadbolt malfunctioning didn’t really come as a surprise. By this point he was basically a chimaera of different bits of code and random pieces of hardware jammed in – Miranda was a quantum physicist, not an expert in robotics. Actually, now that she thought about it, it was strange the Secret Scientists hadn’t yet introduced a robotics expert into their fold, especially with how popular a field it was becoming. She almost yelled out for Deadbolt to make a memo for her to ask the two Saturday adults about it, until she remembered that, currently, he sat dissected and braindead all over her workbench.

Well, he was still more reliable than a human, on average, the occasional hiccup notwithstanding.

On a good day, he’d make it through without a problem, fetching what he was supposed to fetch, getting the door, answering the phone. Miranda was a harsh mistress, and before all that business with Kur, that was all Deadbolt had been meant for – after driving off her last intern (Shelley Abernathy, she remembered, a very bright young girl who’d quit after fainting on the job from exhaustion – as an apology, Miranda had set her up with a letter of recommendation to her own _alma mater_ ), she’d finally taken the advice of her colleagues and made herself an assistant that _could_ work more than sixty hours a week, fifty-two weeks a year.

On a bad day, however, some simple but out-of-the-way task Miranda would ask for help with would cross with one of his battle protocols and he’d end up freezing up until she force-reset him. And on really, really bad days, his head might simply fly off his body, clanging against the ceiling before falling to the ground.

And today had been _exceptionally_ bad.

In simple terms, he’d crashed. Permanently. There’d been some fatal error in his programming and it’d caused all of his systems not only to shut down, but corrupt to the point of irretrievability. The only thing Miranda had managed to salvage from his hard drive basically amounted to a crash report and a solid wall of technical gibberish that she simply had no idea what to do with.

As frustrating as it was, this was simply something she didn’t have time for. Sure, she could definitely sift through all the gibberish on her own, hit the books and go to town, but prior experience taught her that that could take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours to a few days, and, besides that, she just hated coding. Her own chosen field of study was just as fiddly and detail-oriented, perhaps, but at least it was actually fascinating. Coding was a tedious procedure that was merely bearable in when done in small chunks. Unfortunately, this didn’t seem to be a small chunk sort of problem.

So instead of tackling it on her own, she decided to outsource the project so she could hurry up and get on with her life, and settled to ask for help from the one person she knew was always just _itching_ for a chance to prove their competence.

She wouldn’t be talking to him face-to-face, though. _That_ would be more trouble than it was worth.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Dr. Arthur Beeman,  
I’ve run into some trouble with Deadbolt’s programming. My diagnostic says that his hard drive has permanently failed. Attached are the crash report and what I’ve managed to salvage of his internal coding. Help repairing him to a functional state would be appreciated.  
Best,  
Miranda Grey

Almost within a second of her sending it off, she got a reply, and then another, and then another. Definitely not enough time for him to actually have looked at the files attached. She sighed.

There was research to be done, damnit! Unfortunately, despite how little patience she usually had for her coffee stooges, she’d grown attached to her robot, and so fixing Deadbolt had taken priority over discovering the secrets of the universe at a sub-sub-atomic level.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** who is this

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** oh its u chell. good thing ur photo shows up when i hover over ur name.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** have u tried turning it off n back on again

Not for the first time, Miranda wondered why she ever expected anything from this man.

Still, as she was typing up a shorter, snappier reply that yes, she _had_ tried turning him off and back on, her inbox chimed that he’d already sent her yet another message. She saved her draft and went back to it, hoping that this time he’d actually have something useful for her.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** that crash report is weird.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Dr. Arthur Beeman,  
Yes. I know. I wouldn’t have come to you for help if it was something I had time to decipher.  
Speaking of indecipherable, this IS a matter that concerns our professional work. Would it kill you to type with a little more professionalism?  
Miranda Grey

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
dont ask questions u cant handle the answer 2.  
looking @ data now. 1/2hr eta. stay 2ned.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Beeman,  
“2ned”?  
Miranda Grey

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** tuned.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Beeman,  
You’ve reached a new low.  
Miranda

After he failed to respond for several minutes, she figured he’d finally shut up and set to work. Half-hour ETA? Then she had some time to put Deadbolt back together.

It was relaxing, practically ritualistic, a routine she’d gotten used to two years ago. Every few days they’d manage to track down the Saturdays through Beeman’s extensive global monitoring systems; every few days they’d tear Deadbolt apart, every few days she’d put him back together.

She hadn’t disassembled him like this since the aftermath of the cryptid war, actually. He’d done surprisingly well once the Secret Scientists reunited with the Saturdays, and they all turned their efforts to mitigating Argost’s potential damage. It wasn’t obvious how powerful his attack arrays had become until after he was no longer fighting a family that regularly wrestled the most dangerous beasts on the planet – in the heat of battle, he’d surprised everyone with his reliability.

Miranda was even a little bit proud of him.

That was the other nice thing about putting him back together, was the empty space to reflect in. Her usual studies were strenuous on both her mind and body, desperately trying to do advanced calculations in her head before the particles could become too unstable. Failure was usually…explosive, so it took up all her concentration and at least a few gallons of coffee whenever she got into the thick of things.

So it was a little jarring to have the email notification sound interrupt her thoughts, but, well, she couldn’t blame Arthur for that one.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
i hope wall-e was robot baptized, bc hes robot dead.  
danger perception program u wrote was solid, parameters not high enough tho. smth tripped it so bad it broke the internal logic. dominoed down some other programs. part of it caught fire, 85%.  
also questioning why emergency arm detachment protocols r 1 boolean expression away from foot massage. seems dangerous.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Dr. Arthur Beeman,  
That can’t be right. He’s equipped to deal with even the worst of natural disasters in at least eight different forms of perception at the same time. How does something even break those limits?  
Thankfully, it seemed he fell into the 15% of not spontaneously combusting; his hardware all looks fine.  
I was tired that night, needed a foot massage, and it was the most efficient way to program that in. If I remember correctly, didn’t Doc manage to give you quite the shiner that day…?  
Miranda Grey

 **bman@scientiaest.ss  
** hypotheses: 1. some innocent thing randomly triggered a danger response in 9 perceptions. ai does that sometimes. wouldn’t b surprised considering how haphazard most of the code is. 2. a real disaster happened. unlikely bc i would kno abt that. 3. u showed it smth truly horrible n beyond comprehension. but hey, were all in2 weird stuff. im not abt 2 judge.

Miranda couldn’t help the smirk. Beeman was still sore about everything that had happened with the Saturdays, after all; mentioning it was a surefire way to get under his skin.

Still, that was disheartening news. If Beeman said the robot was dead, then it basically meant it was salvageable (nothing was unsalvageable, they were the top genii in the world), but for an amount of time and effort not worth the result.

Well, that was annoying, but Miranda had basically just been asking if there was an easy fix.

 **M_Grey@scientiaest.ss**  
Dr. Arthur Beeman,  
Thank you for your help. That’s all I needed.  
Best,  
Miranda Grey

From the robot parts still lying about her lab she picked out his main CPU, a small green chip about the size of a postage stamp, and tossed it into a drawer of ones just like it, all in varying states of having been melted into slag. She supposed she should just get rid of the roasted parts altogether, since they were now good for nothing but taking up space, but she could never bring herself to do it.

Instead, she stooped down to open another drawer, this one with little postage-sized chips still in their clear, plastic packaging – she’d figured out early on to stockpile parts, though she hadn’t had to bust into this particular drawer in the two years since the war – and cracked the case open, sliding the CPU into a special slot on her computer.

It’d take a few hours for the backup to write itself into the chip, especially since she couldn’t take too much processing power away from the other programs her computers were running. Maybe she should go ahead and throw another upgrade in, for old times’ sake?

Not that she would, because it would be a waste of several million research dollars. But the thought made her smile as she turned Deadbolt’s arm chassis around in her hands. He should be up and running again in no time.

 

* * *

 

Chell’s robot troubles had been a fun distraction. What was also a fun distraction was that Twin Peaks, the cold-weather and geology guy, had also decided to call in, though he at least had the decency to use the holophone rather than the keyboard. That left both of Beeman’s hands free to enjoy his daily meal – a bagel, a cream-cheese-flavored nutrient spread, and a mug filled with 80-proof coffee, where the proof described the caffeine content, and the rest was there to keep it liquid.

He was really living it up today.

“Hey, Arthur,” the geologist said, in his usual upbeat tone. He seemed a little less put-together than usual, his hair not properly spiked up into the two peaks that gave him his name. Beeman just made a grunt of greeting, focused on making sure the nutrient spread was evenly coating the inside of the bread.

Cheechoo’s expression dropped just slightly. Maybe it’d been a bad idea to call Beeman after all – the man didn’t seem to be particularly interested in conversation (then again, when did he ever), and, besides, who knew what kind of intensive research the geologist was interrupting? Beeman was famously always holed up in his hive; the two only ever met in real life for meetings where the fate of the world was at stake. And that seemed to be how Arthur preferred it.

Still, he’d already come this far, so he might as well see it through to the end, right?

“Earlier today some – practically all of the seismometers using my blueprints ended up giving false reads at the same time. I know I gave you one about half a year back so I could have one in your area – did it also…?”

“Wouldn’t know,” Beeman said, finishing off his preparations by scraping the knife against the crust, cleaning it against the bread. Really, laser arrays were the only way to go when you wanted a bagel cut cleanly and in a perfect 11:14 ratio. They were also the only way to reliably get that smooth, flat, crispy, toasted edge. Even if turning that particular array on cost about three thousand dollars.

“Wouldn’t know?”

“Needed parts, your doodad had ‘em. Dismantled the whole thing eighty days ago. Thanks, by the way.”

The geologist stuttered a bit before regaining his composure with the clearing of his throat. Beeman didn’t take notice.

“So, then, uh…are you listening, Arthur?”

“Yeah-huh,” Beeman said, disinterested.

“…Alright, well, basically – it’s weird! I built those machines myself; there’s no way they all just spontaneously decided to have the same malfunction at the same time when they aren’t the same age and they aren’t even all connected to each other!”

Beeman took his time swallowing before he turned to face the geologist, giving the impression his bagel was of far more importance.

“Listen, Woollybear – “

“It’s Paul,” the geologist interrupted. “Cheechoo. You know, you can just tell me if you forgot my name – “

Beeman waved him off dismissively. “How many things are you monitoring at the same time?”

“Uh, well, the seismometer’s the only thing I have going 24/7 right now. Weatherwatch where applicable, I guess.”

“So maybe two things.”

“Weather’s a lot of different things, Arthur, it’s – “

“So maybe one and a half things. The point is, I’m currently monitoring 147. Everything from atmospheric pressure to radiation fluctuations and back. That’s basically what my job is.”

“Really? I thought your job was getting the high score at online Minesweeper.”

“That was a slow week,” Beeman glared. “I know a thing or two about false positives. Here’s thing one: they're annoying as hell. Thing two: there are none.”

“’There are none’?”

Beeman shoved the rest of the bagel into his mouth in one go. “Wha’ I mean is – “ he swallowed. “Either it’s a ‘true’ positive that your equipment’s broken, or it’s a ‘true’ positive for something you didn’t think you were monitoring for in the first place.”

The geologist’s brow furrowed as he considered that perspective. Something he didn’t think he was monitoring in the first place? “Like what?”

“How would I know?” Beeman asked. “Maybe a sunspot. Maybe an army of raccoons. Maybe an entire Atasian scouting fleet disguising itself as a roving asteroid field. Use your imagination, man.”

“So, you have no clue,” Cheechoo said.

“Got it in one, Mammothfur.” There was a series of clicks and whirrs and beeps on his end that filled up the awkward silence as all his equipment recalibrated itself according to the schedule Beeman had set earlier in the day. All the shiny new toys meant he barely had to do anything to maintain his surveillance – but it also meant he had nothing to do all day, on the contrary of what all the other Secret Scientists thought of him.

“Say,” Beeman said, when the last satellite dish had clicked into place, “this pseudo-calamity of yours didn’t happen to have – where are you again, UTC -2?”

“Iceland.”

“12:47 AM?”

There was a pause. “Yeah, actually.”

“Hm,” Beeman said, dragging his chair back over to one of his computer screens. “You might want to give Steambun a call. Her robot went kaput at the same time earlier tonight.”

The implications of that statement suddenly became unnerving, though Beeman was tap-tap-tapping away, unflappable as ever. Cheechoo fidgeted, uncomfortable. He needed to get Miranda on the phone ASAP.

“Then, if that’s everything…”

“Mhm,” Beeman said, already lost in whatever was on his computer screen. He didn’t even look up as the call dropped, sifting through the data presented by his systems from earlier that night.

There, in the strings of letters and numbers, something he’d only glanced at earlier. Four hundred satellite dishes, eight high-powered telescopes, access to data from international space stations and select space imagers, all being processed, compiled, analyzed by three supercomputers in a reinforced room buried at the base of the mountain, and there, 6:47 PM at local time, every source agreed:

Conditions for viewing Unukalhai were exceptionally favorable. To the point where, from anywhere on the Earth, it must have seemed like it had shined brighter for a few seconds.

 

* * *

 

The Saturdays had several different mailing lists stored in their official Secret Scientist email accounts. There was one for world leaders, there was one for Interpol, the heads of the biological science fields, close friends, the local city council, national defense, universities, more. Included with that list was a single option marked in red.

Well, they were all scientists, and no matter how eccentric individuals may be, they could at least be levelheaded when deciding things as a group. And, so, that particular choice was given a very simple name.

“Urgent.”

The list of handles cascaded down the screen. Fifteen years ago, they numbered 50; fourteen, 7. Now, there were 16 of them, with Mizuki as the most recent.

And each one would have a message at the top of their inbox when they checked it next. An outline of what the Saturdays learned tonight, a time and date for those who couldn’t physically make it, and a set of coordinates for those who could.

All that was left to do was send it, except Drew’s finger waivered on the mouse.

“Drew?” Doc asked, brow knitting.

“…”

He gave her a gentle shake on the shoulder. “Drew,” he repeated. “Is there something wrong?”

She shook her head. “No, Doc, sorry. I just…have a bad feeling about this.”

“Well, that’s understandable. To think Argost would be back…not only that, but with the state he left Zak and Fisk in before flying off, it’s like he’s playing with us. Sending us a message that we don’t – “

“Not about that,” she said. “It’s just…with things going like this…it almost feels like déjà vu. Like we’ve gone through these motions before, and the way it left us up last time, world’s most wanted…”

“That won’t happen this time,” Doc said, firmly. “We made sure of it after the war. That was the first time I saw Beeman almost cry.”

They’d taken the scientists aside once the worst of the restoration had passed, and one-by-one they’d all apologized and admitted that there might have been another way, that the Saturdays had been good friends to them all, that it was hasty for them to have jumped to such a drastic measure.

Except Beeman, but it was unlikely any of the Scientists would take his personal opinions seriously ever again.

“I know,” Drew said, though she still didn’t click the button.

“Even though Zak and Fisk are banged up pretty bad and Zak’s still unconscious, they’re both safe. They’re going to be fine.”

“Maybe…” she paused. “Maybe we should wait until he wakes up. See what he knows. I know we talked to Fisk, but there’s only so much he can tell us.”

They had been so scared, terrified, the both of them, when they’d finally arrived through the doors left open for them, only to be met with the limp form of an unconscious Zak, cradled in Fiskerton’s arms.

Bruises all over his body, a splotchy purple mess on his abdomen. Fisk had a swollen cheek, a tender spot on his head.

It could have been worse, they’d thought, but _god_ , what if it had been _worse_?

They’d pushed aside their panic to deal with the gwyllgi left behind, cowering and crying, letting them free in an uninhabited part of the marshes. Fiskerton had tucked in, exhausted, after the parents had gotten as much from him as they could, and Zak, bandaged and disinfected, was resting by his side.

“This _is_ an emergency, though, Drew,” Doc said, cautiously. “The sooner we address it, the better. If Argost is back and he still has his powers, then I’m actually even _more_ surprised that he hasn’t already started using them on a global scale.”

“He’s playing with us,” Drew said. “He knows he can end it at any time, what else could there be? Even if we DO contact the others…what if he’s just waiting for us to gather in one place anyways? Doc, we don’t know enough. We need more information.”

Now it was his turn to think. It was true – Argost was not so subtle that he’d leave such an incomprehensible message as this. If he’d really had his powers, and had Zak and Fiskerton all alone, then it was doubtful they would have found Zak in such a relatively unharmed state.

No, Argost was far crueler than that. And this was an emergency on a higher scale than any emergency before, but they hadn’t even had a solid look at the Yeti, just his ship. Maybe his powers hadn’t returned on the necessary scale? Maybe it wasn’t Argost after all? Or maybe it was simply a trial run of a mimicry?

“…It wouldn’t be good to end up gathering them over a false alarm,” Doc said. “I think you’ve definitely got a point. We should see first if this is something we can deal with as a family…but even if Zak doesn’t wake up, we should send the message by twenty-four hours.”

“Agreed,” Drew said, tiredly pushing the mouse away. She rubbed her eyes, stretching back to lean into Doc’s chest.

God, she was tired.

No mission had left her this exhausted in years. Being played, manipulated, Argost did it well; with all his advantages and all his planning, if that was really him, then Zak, relatively safe and sound, must have meant that something went very wrong.

And…there was yet another thing unsettling her, that filled her intuition with a sense of dread.

Komodo and Zon, on the way up to the castle, had stopped in their tracks. The Saturdays had barely even noticed until the two of them had entered the scene well after the rest of the family had already run to Zak’s side. And while it was normal for Zon to be sleeping in the same room as Doyle – they were partners in crime – it wasn’t normal that Komodo had elected to stay in the brig with the two parents rather than be by Zak’s side while he was so clearly injured.

Almost like he was avoiding him, Drew thought, watching Komodo’s tail swish anxiously back and forth.

 

* * *

 

He recognized this place.

A young forest, overgrown with moss and ferns and horsetails. Giant lace-winged dragonflies zipped by, beetles glittered where they perched on the tree bark, and a thrumming filled the air.

That wasn’t right, was it? The last thing he’d remembered was – broken bits and pieces, Fiskerton attacking him and then suddenly Fisk was _behind_ him, choking him in a sleeper hold, and Argost and Munya and the other orange hominid were all limping away – the marshes of Wales, the castle courtyard, that’s where he was supposed to be, not a jungle in the tropic zone, dripping with life and humidity.

His mind told him that there should be birdsong, but his memories told him there should not. How could something like that exist here, now? Birds still had several centuries yet to come.

The name came to him suddenly, and he was relieved, knowing where he was. Laurasia, between Pangaea and North Asia, between Triassic and Jurassic. A paradise trapped in time.

“ _That’s right._ ”

Like ice in summer heat, washing down Zak’s spine with a chill. He turned.

Whatever he was going to say caught in his throat. What was staring at him did so completely at ease, leaning against the trunk of an ancient conifer, arms crossed. Its hair, shoulder-length and messy, white against black, stirred loosely in the breeze. The black jacket was slung lazily around its shoulders. A smile – or maybe a sneer – played on its lips. And its eyes stared Zak dead in his, shadowed by the bangs that fell into its face and the black bags beneath, only serving to highlight the intensity of the fire burning in its orange eyes.

Zak recognized _that_ , too.

“You…”

“ _Yes,_ ” the serpent confirmed. “ _Me, and you._ ”

In the distance, Zak could hear the sea, rolling and crashing under the summer sun.

The serpent was the first to speak, calm and even, resting its head against the bark of the tree with an easiness that only put Zak further on guard.

He’d long seen this figure in his nightmares, in the flashes and broken fragments left over by the naga's influence and Tsul’ Kalu’s fears. A version of him covered in blood and ash, laughing in the face of the end of the world. But this was the first time it had ever spoken to him, and in its voice Zak heard his own, darker, deeper, barely above a whisper but thrumming with a power that commanded all those who heard it to listen.

Take heed.

And this time…this time, Zak was sure, it was no longer just a _dream_.

“ _There is very little we have to discuss, it seems._ ”

It took a while to find his voice. “…That’s right.” As much defiance as he could spit. “I don’t have anything to say to you.”

The serpent only smiled at him, a cruel and twisted mockery of Zak’s own expressions.

“ _At least_ ,” it said, “ _we should introduce ourselves._ ”

An innocent enough request.

“…I’m Zak,” he finally allowed. “Zak Saturday.”

“ _Then,_ ” the Serpent said, grinning even wider, “ _I, too, am Zak Saturday._ ”

A fear that scorched him like the burning cold, as he understood exactly what the serpent meant.

“ _That is one of my many names,_ ” said Kur.

 


	11. a locked groove.

"NO!"

Zak shot out of unconsciousness, only to bang his head against a metal pipe and fall back to the ground, clutching his forehead and writhing in pain. Jesus Christ, and he could all but hear the serpent laughing at him as it retreated to the dark end of his mind. Every day, the news he woke up to was worse and worse; frustrating – so frustrating, frustrating! What was he going to do? His parents. He had to -

Something grabbed his leg and _pulled_ , yanking Zak down the metal shaft.

…Metal shaft?

It was too dark to see, but he could feel the ridges of the welding beneath his back, could hear the slide of scale against steel. The grip around his ankle was firm - reptilian.

"Komodo?" Zak asked, groggily trying to keep his balance as he was yanked around tight corners and up steep inclines.

"PLEASE be quieter, I am begging you. Truly."

Though it took him several seconds to figure out where he remembered that voice from, the moment he did, Zak began to thrash about, desperately trying to break free.

"Get AWAY!" he yelled, kicking Muca's grip loose from his leg. But that only prompted her to pounce on his body and pull that along, instead, one clawed hand covering his mouth, muffling him. It was too hard to see in the pitch black; his wild flailing only met with the metal walls, fists banging uselessly against the steel.

"The weakest of their kind," Rani Nagi had called her. Maybe so, compared to the big buff guards she kept around. Pfft, yeah, right. Zak could take her in a fair fight, maybe, but when she had the advantage of it being dark, cramped, and terrifying...

Eventually, he stopped flailing, more out of the pain in his knuckles than any real sense of surrender. After a few more minutes of navigating through the airship's ventilation shafts - Zak was sure that was where they were, now, from the brief glimpses he managed to get where light leaked through the grates - they ducked down a long vertical drop, Muca's scales finding some kind of purchase on the steel that let them descend smooth, fast, and controlled.

They landed in a dark room, cramped full of machinery, lit by small red and green bulbs all down the equipment. The engine room - Zak knew it from his parents warning him not to go in there unsupervised. Full of dangerous, partially experimental technology, one wrong move might mean your hand on something burning hot or electrically live.

Muca, having set Zak down, was tasting the air with her tongue, pressing her ear against the floor, slithering back and forth between different entrances to the room to make sure the coast was clear.

That was when Zak realized something - the engine was running.

That meant they were still in the sky. Wherever they were, it was morning, judging from the way the light looked and how long he felt like he'd been asleep. And Muca was on the ship with him, Muca had BEEN on the ship with them...

"Are you going to tell me what's going on?" Zak hissed at her, crossing his arms and drawing back. The Claw, he noticed, was still on his belt loop, and he found himself wanting to reach for it, have it in hand.

"That's an acceptable volume, thank you. Especially with the contraptions in here to mask our conversation." Muca whispered back. "Hello! It's me, Mucalinda. Please pardon the rough transit, my...what should I be calling you again? Master? My liege? Most great and terrible Kur, scourge of the human race, end of all that is benevolent, my - "

"Just. Zak." It took a lot of self-control not to snap at her.

"...Alright. Well, my apologies again, Just Zak, but, you see, when you awoke, those currently patrolling the ship were alerted to our presence. So, since I did not want to be eaten, and I did not want you to be potentially destroyed a second or third time, I ran."

"Eaten?" Zak asked, and then, more urgently, "who's on the ship?"

The way she’d said it had made it sound like it wasn’t just his parents. Besides, if she’d been hiding in the vents this whole time, then there wouldn’t be a reason for her to only decide to act now, if that were the case.

"It's really quite the disaster," Muca continued, by way of answer. "Maybe it wouldn't be, if you had had more time to recover your strength, but as-is, it's quite the calamaity. I would even dare to say that this might ruin everything! Ah, if the garuda don't eat me, my queen will. Rotisserie!"

"'Garuda'?” He knew that word. “You mean that secret society of illusionists that tried to kill me with the Flute of Gilgamesh?"

"Much worse," Muca said, with a cheerful tone to mask the sheer terror that was becoming apparent on her features. "We should have killed them all several thousands of years ago, but then, several thousand years have passed! It's completely expected for them to have returned by now! A miscalculation. Forgetful! Incompetent! Well, enough about me: two hous ago this metal beetle was accosted and boarded by the garuda and their masters, and, quite frankly, we have a foot in death's door  - metaphorically. I don't actually have feet, you see - "

Zak was getting frustrated. Metal beetle? She must mean the airship. So something came on the airship. But what could possibly board while they were in mid-flight? Garuda…garuda…garuda.

…Oh, the memory flashed in his mind. Mom’s book, decals on tombs, ancient artifacts – giant eagles with fiery wings that preyed on the Naga and serpents with impunity. But their masters?

"Who, Muca? Who's on the ship?"

Muca stilled, one of her ears twitching in reaction to something down the hallway. Quick as a lightning strike, she grabbed Zak and pulled him up over the machinery with a deftness Zak hadn't been expecting from her, the vent's grate at the end of her tail. They practically flew into the shaft they had come from, Muca's coils immediately bracing against the metal to keep them suspended over the opening, as she fit the grate back into place with a quiet click just as the door to the engine room slid open.

Rather than say it, she would let him see. Through the black slits of the metal, Zak could just barely make out what Muca had heard earlier, quiet thudding footsteps from something much heavier than his mom or dad. If he had to say, the sound reminded him of Fisk.

...As did the tan fur that suddenly came into view, the two tufts on the figure's ears, the broad shoulders, large hands.

Zak would have called out for him if Muca's hand wasn't suddenly covering his mouth again, and he couldn't feel her trembling.

Then the figure turned, searching for them.

The eyes, the face, the brown spots - no, it wasn't Fisk. At the same time, it looked just like Fisk; for a moment, Zak panicked, thinking that the smoke mirror version of him had returned, until a closer inspection revealed that this figure was much smaller than the brother Zak knew. That tan was a wrong color, those eyes were the wrong shape. It carried itself differently. That’s-Not-Fisk sniffed around, peering into the dark, red eyes looming and ominous and unfamiliar, and Zak was suddenly very glad that he had heeded Muca's warning.

Ah, the garuda were the enemies of the Naga – that must mean their masters…

The Lemurian gave the room one final sweep before turning to go, padding back to the door, letting its automated whirr as it clicked shut see it out. When it had gone so far Zak could no longer hear it walking, he let out the breath he'd been holding, and Muca did the same, before pulling him back up the ventilation shaft, back into the comforting darkness.

"Where is," Zak breathed, so quietly he could barely even hear himself, "my family?"

"The room with all the other metal beetles, there is a door to your parents' chambers. The Lemurians are holding them there."

Just down the hangar bay.

"Why?" Zak asked. "I'm the one they're after."

"They believe you have used your dark powers to influence the others into helping you. Especially the one you call your brother. Which would have been incredible if true, but - "

"They have nothing - I haven't done anything to them! They'd know if they asked - "

Muca only looked at him, and Zak was suddenly reminded that he was talking to a naga.

"Why," he said, putting distance between them, "should I trust you? You tricked me into touching that spear in the first place. You've been hiding out on the ship ever since, haven't you? If I think about it, this is all YOUR fault! We wouldn’t even be in this mess if I hadn’t gotten those memories!"

Muca had shrunk into her coils defensively, hands grasping at each other in - shame? Worry? ...Guilt?

Her voice came out like a squeak. "You would have died - !"

"There had to have been another way." It was a hollow statement – just like separating his own existence from Kur, he already knew the level of impossibility that came with it, but it was all he had.

"If there was one it was not one that we - what other choices did we have? The Kur stone exhausted, the Relic destroyed - what would we do if you were to perish? How would this world turn without Kur?"

"It's been doing just fine up until now!"

"Has it?" She asked, voice cracking, lunging forward and rising as high as the vent would allow. Zak scrambled backwards in reflex, hands slipping on the steel.

They stared at each other, Muca's eyes red and wide in the darkness, her claws cutting scratches into the metal, before her ear twitched again and she whipped around toward the sound that Zak was only just beginning to hear.

"...Zak?"

Mom's voice. It came - Zak looked wildly from left to right, trying to pinpoint where she was calling from.

"Mom!" He yelled back, scrambling down the shaft. This way - yes, this way - he could hear her getting louder -

"Zak - Doc, I heard - "

"Mom, I'm here, I'm in the vents!"

"Zak! My baby boy, oh - "

They met at one of the grates, both of them pressing up against it like sheer force of will would be enough to undo the screws. It was just as well that Doc managed to catch up when he did, power glove on one hand, practically ripping the entire wall out. With it, Zak came tumbling down, into Drew's arms, and he swore to himself he'd never be embarrassed to get a hug from his parents ever again.

"You're safe," Doc said, relief evident in his voice. "I'll radio the others and tell them we found you."

"I thought you guys were being locked up in your room on the ship?"

Drew smiled. "Looks like we took a page from your book, kiddo. Komodo sneaked out through one of the vents and knocked our guards out. Then, well.” She pantomimed a couple punches with a cheeky grin. “You know the drill."

Zak couldn't help smiling, either. He wished he was there for it.

"What about you?" Drew asked. "What happened? From the sounds of it, the Lemurians are half-tearing the ship apart looking for you."

"'Respectfully'," Doc interjected. Every word was seething. "Remember, that's how they phrased it. They're going to 'respectfully' hold us prisoner on our own ship and turn it over looking for our son."

"Ugh," Drew said, with her best don't-remind-me face.

"I..." Zak said, looking up through the grate. As expected, Muca was already out of sight. "It's...a long story. I don't know if we have the time right now. I need to know exactly what's going on, though – I was unconscious for most of it."

Drew nodded, standing up. He brow furrowed as she tried to remember. "To be honest, it's kind of a blur. These big red eagles - garuda - pull up alongside the ship with Lemurians sitting on them, and next thing we know we're down in the hangar bay welcoming them in like we're all old friends."

"Some kind of charisma ability," Doc mused. "Even I'm not sure how they did it yet. Everything they were saying sounded so...reasonable. Right up until they asked us to hand you over. Even now..."

"Even now?" Zak asked, tilting his head.

Doc tilted his head. "You can't hear them?"

"No."

"They're probably not broadcasting to him," Drew said.

"It's telepathy, Zak."

"Telepathy..."

"Which would have been fascinating to discuss in further detail," Doc continued, grumbling, "if the ones using it weren't so..."

"GWARZHA BABAR!!"

The wind was all knocked out of Zak's lungs as he was tackled from behind by big arms and an excited screech.

"Fisk! Oh man, Fisk, it's you, huh?"

"Boo-bu-bu-bu-bu - !" _I'm so glad you're safe._

Doyle came jogging up behind him, followed by Komodo and Zon. He smiled when he saw Zak, raising a hand up in greeting.

"Hey, kid. Some Houdini you pulled on us, huh? Good to see you're doing alright."

"Hey, Doyle," Zak said, attempting to raise his own hand out from under Fisk's bear hug. "I guess I'm late to Fisk's family reunion?"

"Humph." Fisk crossed his arms, his displeasure with the rest of his "family" clear on his face.

"How's the situation on the rest of the ship?" Drew asked, turning. Doyle's smile dropped as he became serious, hands curling into fists at his side. "They're gathering in the bridge, looks like a defensive formation. They're probably trying to steer the whole thing somewhere, is my guess. Seven of them in there, all the others are tied up back in you guys' room. But if they got the hands on the controls..."

"They can open the ship if reinforcements arrive," Drew finished, turning to look down the hallway where the control center was. "Seven on six, huh."

"Even numbers if we count Zak," Doyle said. Zak nodded.

"No," Drew said immediately. "He's not going to be in this fight."

"What?!" Zak and Doyle responded in unison.

"He's the Lemurians' target," Doc said, in his usual calm tone. "Finding and securing him is their win condition - and our lose condition. I would have told you to take him in the Griffin and run, but those eagles have our ship surrounded, and they might be fast enough to catch up. They caught up to the airship, after all."

"Didn't we have this same talk two years ago?" Zak asked, indignant. "Where on the ship could be safer than with you guys?"

"I'm with Mini-Man on this one," Doyle said, and Fisk agreed, crossing his arms and puffing his chest out.

Drew was about to protest again when the ship gave a great, shuddering heave. The family was nearly knocked off-balance. They were starting a descent.

"We're landing..." Doc breathed, before snapping to his senses and pulling his wrist display up. "...And it looks like we're not landing at home."

"We don't have time for this," Zak said, with finality. "We need to get to the controls, and we need to get there as fast as we can, with as much manpower as we can. I'm coming with you guys."

"...Alright," Drew acquiesced at last. "But stay in the middle of the pack. Yell out the moment something happens, don't get separated - "

Zak put his hand on her shoulder, steeling his expression. "I know."

Drew returned the look. Her features softened as she put her hand on Zak's, squeezing it tight.

"...You've grown up, haven't you?" She asked.

She closed her eyes and turned, drawing her sword out of its sheath. Following suit, Doc readied his glove, Doyle his blaster, and Zak's hands found the familiar grip of the claw, the hand of Tsul'Kalu clicking open at the end.

"We've only got one shot at this, Doc said. "We’ll be too close to the ground to pull out of the descent in thirty minutes, so that's our time limit. Everyone ready?"

Zak could only smile, widening his stance, quashing the uneasiness inside himself. "I was born ready," he said.

 

* * *

 

"Oh no," Muca said, absently picking at her scales with one of her claws. "Oh no, oh no, oh no."

 

* * *

 

In the bridge were gathered seven lemurians; around the ship flew eight garuda, each the size of a fighter jet, with scarlet and gold plumage all down their wings and backs. Two flew in front of the ship, visible through the large windows of the command center, while the other six took up escort positions around it.

But the lemurians weren't watching them. Silent and expressionless, their focus was all turned towards the door they'd sealed shut with the ship's internal security systems, to the banging they could hear against the metal as the Saturdays attempted to ram their way in.

Every hit made the steel shudder, though it seemed far from giving way. Still, the lemurians were uneasy, adjusting their white cloth wraps, flexing their fists. Just because they were pacifistic did not mean they would refuse to fight, and just because the humans and animals were innocents corrupted by Kur's dark grip didn't mean they would hold back - that was the consensus that had been reached, when the family had burst its way out of confinement, and had rallied once more around the serpent in human form.

The air was rife with tension and focus, each lemurian polishing their concentration, ready to receive the Saturdays the moment they burst in.

So focused, in fact, that they failed to notice a grate being pulled out of the wall in time with the rhythmic banging, that they failed to notice an invisible lizard slink to the floor.

And then there was Zak, dropping in with as loud of a clatter as he could, whipping the claw around to grab the closest Lemurian and pulling him to the ground, down the stairs. The Lemurians whipped around immediately, and, at that moment, the door opened all on its own. The Saturdays burst in all in one wave, Doc’s glove already glowing from using it to pound the door as a distraction. They took the Lemurians by surprise, and behind the family, Komodo, with his claws on the touchpad that served as the door’s lock, gave a supremely self-satisfied growl.

"Zak," Drew yelled, ramming the butt of her sword into where she guessed the solar plexus must be, "dropping down on your own is NOT 'staying in the middle of the pack'!"

"It's a classic pincer formation!" Zak returned, cheerfully dodging a fist. "I get their attention away from the door, you guys come busting in when their heads are turned - whoa!"

One of the lemurians, an older one with white-streaked fur, had grabbed him from his blind spot, attempting to climb over the rest of the family to get him to the door.

"Sorry, but I've got a reputation of 'favorite uncle' to protect, here."

Doyle was up in his face immediately, rising up to meet him with his jetpack. He moved to throw a punch, but before it could connect, the lemurian had grabbed him with its feet and used Doyle’s own momentum to send him flying into one of the windows.

"Doyle!" Zak yelled. He flailed just a little harder, trying to keep his captor’s attention in that direction, because -

Both of them felt the impact as Zon collided with them, talons first, and they both went dropping to the ground. Zak was caught inches away from the top of a computer - the sharp end - just in time, his sister chirping cheerfully as she set him down easy. Doyle came jogging up to meet them, rubbing his head where he'd hit it, but nonetheless grinning ear-to-ear, glad his distraction play with Zon had worked.

"Favorite uncle?" He asked.

"Well, Zon did most of the work. So favorite sister, actually."

She chirred in agreement. Doyle just rolled his eyes.

"Whatever. I still have - " His hands flew to his chest, then his pants pockets, patting himself down with a clear frustration on his face. "Aw - they took my flashbangs!"

"Uh, not the biggest problem right now - "

The biggest Lemurian was charging at them, muscles rippling under its fur, a good three inches taller than Fisk ever was. Immediately, Doyle was grappling with it, neither willing to budge an inch, though it was clear Doyle was losing in terms of strength.

That was, until Fisk came barreling in, tackling it low and knocking it off balance. With the path clear, the rest of the family came to join them, a defensive formation with Zak at the center, close to the windows, squaring off against the Lemurians. The family would either be captured here, or they would push the lemurians back; like this, there was no way to retreat to a different part of the ship. But that was fine – if they were going to go down, they would do it together; that was what a family was.

About ten minutes had elapsed out of thirty. Twenty minutes left.

…As much as Zak hated to admit it, his family was starting to look like the underdogs, here.

The lemurians had initially been taken by surprise, but they’d since regrouped, and were clearly capable of fighting as a group just as much as the Saturdays were. To make matters worse, each was as strong as Fisk, if not moreso. The memories - and bruises - of Zak’s own fight with a lemurian were painfully fresh, and if all that the lemurians had to do was fend them off the controls until the ship touched down and reinforcements arrived...

Meanwhile, deep inside him, the voice that had kept quiet up until now let out a small, dark chuckle.

<Human child, you carry a great evil inside you.> Suddenly, a voice in his head. It felt as if the thought emanated from his own mind, resonating within him. A surprise, except Zak had been recently well-acquainted with foreign words inside his head - yes, if he'd been taken off-guard, he could almost have assumed the thought was his own.

Just like the stone statue at Shangri-La, the voice spoke with a smooth, sonorous tone that projected ancient knowledge and wisdom. It practically screamed trustworthy and benevolent, but perhaps because Zak was already expecting just that, or perhaps because of the black hole in his mind where the snake resided, all its charm was lost on him. If anything, his grip around the claw only tightened, as a sense of invaded privacy took hold.

<That darkness, is a cruelty beyond all comprehension. It announced its presence just a few hours ago, as if commanding the world to fall to its knees - and yet, when we fight you, we feel not the bloodlust presented to the world - why is that?>

"Zak?" Doc asked, noticing the stiffening of his son’s shoulders and the widening of his stance.

"They're talking to me," he replied to his father, and then, to the Lemurians, "you guys are about two years late to the party. War of the cryptids? Kur vs. Kur? That already happened. I'm not about to hurt anyone, so why don't we all just go home?"

The Lemurians - expressionless, unsettlingly so, compared to the range of emotions Zak had come to associate with Fisk - glanced at each other, a mental group huddle without physical movement. When they spoke again - somehow Zak could tell that the voice was coming from the aged one, clearly the leader, the one that had picked him up during the fight - it was so the entire family could hear.

<Zak,> they said, <we can sense your hesitation. There is something dark within you, isn't there? A different presence.>

"D...don't use my name," he said, though he winced at the truth.

"What are they talking about, Zak?" Drew asked, quietly.

<You yourself must realize what will happen if it is not contained. You must know it better than all of us. We, also, would like to avoid needless violence. It is clear now that your family truly cares for you...our apologies for the mistake. But the lives of billions hang in the balance; won't you make the right choice and come with us?>

 _Well, Zak?_ The other voice inside him was darkly amused. Zak hadn’t been expecting it to speak up, since it’d been so quiet up until now.

_Even after everything, these children have only “good intentions.” That much, you can trust. In fact, I even have a guess as to what they intend to do with us…_

Images flashed through his mind unbidden. Trees – pines – he knew the species. _Wollemia nobilis_ , the Wollemi pine. Mom’s been trying to get a sapling for their cryptid greenhouse for ages. Amber – resin. Yes, its special attribute, a defense mechanism. When threatened, it releases a bubble of resin, supposedly impenetrable, that freezes everything in it as if trapping a moment in time.

Not just for a time, no. Not how the lemurians were intending to use it. Forever.

“You’re going to trap me in magic tree sap?!” Zak asked, incredulous. The Lemurians stiffened – as good as a yes in Zak’s mind. Clearly, they weren’t expecting him to know.

<…The return of Kur means that not even death is enough to keep it captive. The world will not be safe until it is permanently contained – >

But no one in the family was listening anymore.

Doc answered for them all. “If we weren’t about to hand him over to the Scientists that wanted him in cryostasis until they could ‘find a solution,’ we’re _not_ handing him over to _you_.”

Zak raised his weapon in agreement.

<…Perhaps there is no reasoning with those Kur has touched, after all.> For the first time, the Lemurians emoted, lowering their heads and raising their hackles, baring their teeth in feral snarls.

 _Déjà vu_ , Zak thought.

“Get to the controls!” Doc yelled out, rushing in with fists raised high. With that, both sides sprang towards each other, fist and claw, tooth and steel.

_Hahaha._

“Shut up,” Zak growled to the voice none could hear but himself.

Though each member of the family was well-versed in fighting – indeed, they were practiced fighting even the lemurians, having all sparred with Fisk during their training sessions – the coordination of their opponent was beginning to prove too difficult a challenge to overcome in their limited time. Communicating in complete silence, the lemurians could move to cover any weakness, blocked every attempt to push through. The ship continued sinking, the clouds rushing up to fill the windows with an impenetrable white.

Ten minutes left.

Zak and Fiskerton working in tandem while Komodo confused the enemy – every fighting instinct that had dulled since the Scientists were on their tail was sharpening as the fight wore on. Your arm, my leg, both ends, back-to-back. Carving a path to the main ship controls, as Doc and Drew scrambled madly to get their hands on the touchpad screens, what they needed most to secure.

But every time they swept one of the lemurians out of the way, another sprang up to take their place, a tight-knit teamwork. Like a net, or a fort’s rampart, they repelled any attempt to pass. For them, it was a matter of life-or-death on a global scale; every single one had come with the conviction to do whatever was necessary to protect the world.

Five minutes left.

The clouds began to dissipate, and then parted entirely, as the ship pushed through them, the high, snowy peaks of a mountain raising up out of the ground to greet them. They were no closer to the controls than they had been at the start – even with everyone giving it their all, teeth grit and breath heavy with exertion – they weren’t going to make it. They weren’t going to make it in time.

And that was when they all saw it, everyone in the brig; a bright orange streak out the corners of their eyes banking and rolling through the clouds. The fight stilled as everyone turned to watch it.

Doc breathed out in disbelief.

“The…Griffin? But who…”

The eagles were chasing it, but instead of flying away, instead, it weaved tightly around the ship, the eagles losing their chances to seize it with their talons as they flapped madly to correct their inertia. All but ramming the garuda escorting the front, missing by a hair’s breadth, the Griffin led the eagles into each other, crashing and talon-locked, and, dazed and confused, the garuda let the jet slip away from them. It flew far out forward, toward the horizon, and it looked like whoever was piloting it would be able to escape – and then it turned around, looped back again…

“GET DOWN!” Drew yelled, mere moments before, at speeds nearly high enough to break the sound barrier, the Griffin came screaming at the front of the ship, crashing through the windows, shooting broken glass and bits of metal over everyone within.

Alarms went off in bright red flashing lights, the smell of fire and exhaust, a shudder that knocked everyone off their feet. Screeching as metal scraped against metal, as the Griffin fell out of the gaping hole it had created.

And Zak was airborne.

Like being dragged out by a hand made of wind pressure, Zak had been sucked through the break in the windows, shards of glass flying with him tearing at his skin, through his clothes. Breathless, windless, practically asphyxiating, he found himself in freefall thousands and thousands of feet above the ground, world spinning around him – no, _he_ was spinning, tumbling without purchase no matter where his flailing hands grabbed, tears streaming out of his eyes from the wind and the biting cold.

Brief flashes in his vision – he’d shout out if his voice could sound – his family falling, the lemurians, too, the eagles flashing red and gold in the sunlight, great black talons reaching out for him, the Griffin underneath him with its window open –

The claws reaching for him whiffed so close to his body he could hear them clack shut, and then his entire body crashed into something hard, unforgiving, and everything hurt, everything hurt, everything hurt –

Noises – an incessant beeping, the sound of the window clicking shut, the droning of an engine, nervous tapping, claws against metal dashboard –

“Ehrm,” Muca’s voice, “the panel is telling me it’s been ‘critically damaged.’ You wouldn’t happen to know how to, ah, make it stop, would you?”

Muca –

“Stop,” Zak begged, broken, as he tried in vain to push himself off from the myriad supplies Muca had haphazardly tossed into the backseat. “Turn back – my family – we have to go back for them!“

“We’d lose,” she said, nervous. “they’ll be safe. I think. Probably.”

“You _think_?”

“The Lemurians wouldn’t hurt them. They are our…opposite? In ideology.”

“They’re falling – “

“The garuda will catch them. Innocents, you see, not to be sacrificed in pursuit.”

Zak, finally managing to pull himself up, ignoring the bruises and cuts and welts that ached and stung all over, pressing his hand against the glass, gazing back.

The eagles, the people, the ship, they were already so small on the horizon. At this distance, he couldn’t even tell debris apart from living being. Even if they turned back now, they’d never be able to make it in time. The only thing he could do was pray for the best, to whatever could answer his prayers.

Muca’s broken sob turned his attention away, back to the pilot’s seat, where she had awkwardly squeezed herself in.

“Oh, I thought we were going to _die_. I thought we were going to _die_ and I would be _eaten_. Did you see the look in that garuda’s eye? I’m too delicious for my own good!”

A ridiculous statement that was just enough to snap Zak back to attention.

“Muca,” Zak said, suddenly serious, “do you know how to fly this ship?”

She perked up as her name was said. “Fly? Oh, yes, that was easy enough to figure out. Very intuitive. You see, tilt like this – “ the plane swerved to the side, sending Zak crashing into the assorted pile of _stuff_ again “ – and it does that, tilt the other way – “

“Stop! Okay. Okay. Uh…” He grasped his head between his hands, trying to block out the pain and _think_.

“Erm, but, Just Zak, if I may…”

“What?” He snapped.

“I don’t know how to _land_ it.”

Zak stared at her, uncomprehending.

“…What?”

“Erm, I don’t know how to land it. I can’t seem to make it slow down? I can only seem to go faster.”

“How did you even get it out of the hangar bay in the first place?!”

“Sheer desperation!” She replied, just as panicked.

“Move out of the way, let me see the controls – “

She obliged, snaking around the side of the seat to let Zak sit. He stared at the blinking lights and gas pedals, mind blanking, as he placed his hands on the joystick.

“Okay,” he mumbled to himself. Focus. Gotta figure it out. Worry about his family later – make it to the ground _alive_ now.

Mom had given him lessons on how to pilot it before, once he turned fourteen. But he’d never been allowed to do the actual takeoff or landing; he only knew the basics of how to steer.

Think! What did he know about landing a plane?

First – c’mon, Zak, mom went through it on paper with you before, remember! – first, level the plane. Attitude indicator – his eyes searched for it on the dashboard. There it is – they were tilted from when Muca had demonstrated the controls; he eased the joystick to the right until they were level with the sky and the ground. As he eased off the controls and engaged he auto-land, the nose automatically dipped downwards just slightly. Alright, cleared step one.

Two – pull back the throttle, ease off the engine. He could hear it rumbling softer underneath him, until the clouds stopped screaming past and they were drifting, coasting. Almost pleasant, were it not for the rattling of Muca’s tail against what she’d thrown in the backseat, or the constant beeping from the ship indicating its heavy damage and need for repairs.

Three…actually landing. Oh boy. Slats and flaps were on the side of the throttle, let’s see…

“It’s gonna be rough,” he said out loud, though he wasn’t sure if he was trying to warn Muca or himself. Muca, for her part, kept her mouth shut, and only nodded, bracing against the walls.

The Griffin shuddered as the flaps raised and caught the wind, and Zak hurried to stabilize the ship, turn it in toward the crosswind. So, they had flaps.

Next, the slots – but as he opened them, the jet sank, and Zak panicked until he remembered that a sudden drop was normal.

…Right?

They seemed to be falling faster than they usually did with his mom at the helm, flying at an already low altitude over acres and acres of chaparral. But the display was confirming that their speed was dropping, which Zak had to count as a victory.

They continued their descent like that for several minutes, growing worryingly close to a large city in the distance. But pulling up now would also be dangerous, the way the ship’s flaps dragged on the wind. By now, Zak was sure that he’d opened up the flaps and slots too much, but he didn’t know how to ease them to halfway – they were stuck like this, it seemed.

The wilds gave way to carefully cultivated fields, farms. Pens with livestock; they were close enough now that Zak could make out the individual patterns of spots on the cows.

…And close enough to realize how fast they were still going. But it was too late to pull out of the landing, wheels engaged and spoiler ready; oh, god.

His parents should be able to cover all the massive collateral damage he was about to inflict, right?

“Hold on to something,” he yelled, bracing himself against the pilot seat. He didn’t have to turn to see Muca’s expression of pure, unadulterated fear.

They hit the ground with a bang, with a crash, with the angry rumble of wheels moving too fast. As if every part of the Griffin were protesting, creaking and crying, popping up over the uneven terrain as it skidded its way up and down over the hills.

Their wheels hit a rock with a loud, angry bang and the ship was tossed back in the air, crashing back into the ground with enough force to knock the wind out of Zak’s lungs. The wheels must have snapped off or something; the ship was leaning on its side as it continued to slide forward, leaving a trail of dust and a deep gouge in the earth.

They broke through a metal fence, crashed through a couple trees – an orchard, Zak thought, dazed – before finally hitting a stump dead-on and tossing everything out the front windshield (which had come loose when they first hit the ground). Everyone – Zak, Muca, supplies, and all – went tumbling into the dirt, bones rattled, muscles sore, but – miraculously – alive.

“Woo,” Zak said, rolling onto his back and weakly punching the air with his fist.

“ _Mujhe doktar se milana hai,_ ” Muca agreed.

They lay there recovering for a long time, Zak letting his mind go blissfully blank. It could only have been a couple hours, maybe three, since he woke up, but he was already exhausted; every joint was sore, every muscle hurt to move, and he was probably still bleeding from a split lip or a cut or two, but, right now, all of that was nothing. They’d made it to the ground, they were alive, somehow, there were no major injuries – nothing short of a miracle. Heart pounding, coming off the adrenaline high, right now there was nothing but relief and exhaustion.

But it wasn’t long before all his worries came creeping back up to his consciousness, every anxiety expanding in the open air. His family – Muca said they were probably alright, and Muca hadn’t actually lied to him yet, but until he saw them with his own eyes he just couldn’t rest easy on that point.

Plus, where were they? His communicator had a GPS on it, he remembered. He nearly dropped the device on his own face as he pulled it out of his pocket and powered it up to check. Ah, so they had crashed right outside of Sacramento…

…Huh. He didn’t think that they were in America. Wasn’t Shangri-La somewhere in the Himalayas? What were lemurians doing out here?

…Speaking of lemurians…

 _Yes,_ the voice inside his head answered, _we’re alive. I’m still here. Good job._

Zak groaned.

Because the Lemurians were right – Zak did know better than anyone just how much of a danger it would be if that… _thing_ inside of him went loose. And he was keeping it in check for now, but how long was that going to last? 

_Not very._

“Shut up, you.”

He let his hand fall back to the ground.

He had no idea where to even start looking for his parents, anyway. He could follow the track they’d gouged out of the ground for an idea of what direction to start the search, but they’d done so much in-air maneuvering to get here that he had no idea how faithful the direction would be. Plus, the only real look he’d gotten of where the Lemurians were taking the family was an aerial view of some giant mountain, and California was just riddled with those, and they all looked the same from a bird’s-eye view.

Not that the Griffin would be in any condition to fly, after all this.

So did that mean…?

No. He couldn’t give up hope. There had to be something – _something_ he could do – he was Zak freakin’ _Saturday_ , the latest in a long line of daredevils, heroes, and geniuses; after he got some food in him, after he got some rest, he’d figure something out. He’d find a way to fix this whole mess. He had to. Not even just because of that indomitable Saturday spirit; if he didn’t throw himself entirely into making things right, if he didn’t make a plan, he might just go mad from the worry.

At the very least, he thought, if this was rock bottom, things couldn’t get any worse.

“Well, well, well,” a lilting voice accompanied by footsteps came floating out over the wreckage. Even upside-down, Zak would recognize the bottom of that horrible outdated forest-green trench coat anywhere.

He _had_ to stop jinxing himself like this.

“Here lies our golden boy, Zak Saturday. I wonder what sort of _utter disaster_ he’s gotten himself mixed up in _this_ time.”

“Hey, Francis,” Zak said, sarcasm and irritation dripping from every word. “You come around here often?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome 2 da jam


	12. Die Wette biet ich!

Francis, or, as Zak would put it, the worst. At what? Well, just in general - worst guy to be around, worst guy to look at, just, you know. _The worst_. So, of course he’d show up here: rock bottom.

Zak pointedly decided to ignore the gloved hand Francis offered to help him up, opting instead to drag his battered body to its feet on his own. Leaning against a nearby tree for support, he crossed his arms and only glared, Francis’s expression remained as detached and smug behind his tinted goggles and his one flappy bang of white hair.

“ _What,_ ” Zak spat, “are you doing here.”

“When our systems reported a high-power anomaly across several key observational sites, I had a _hunch_.” He smiled. “And look what we have here. Mommy’s Boy is going through a rebellious stage; I never thought I’d see the day.”

Zak’s fingers curled up into his sleeves. A high-power anomaly? He could only guess at what _that_ could have been.

“I _thought_ we agreed to never see each other again.”

“Yes, well, and _I_ thought perhaps you’d be smart enough to understand that that’s only possible if you don’t get in too much trouble. Alas, it seems the apple falls far from the trees, where intelligence is concerned. Pity, I thought the Saturday genes were stronger.”

He shrugged, raising his arms, before continuing. “Believe it or not, I have every intention of following through with our prior agreement. I’m simply here to confirm that I _can_.”

“What’s stopping you?” Zak asked.

Francis gestured at the wreckage of the Griffin.

“I fail to believe that this happened due to something my People can just ignore. Which makes it something I just can’t ignore.”

“Try anyways,” Zak said, turning on his heel to limp back to the wreck and salvage what he could. Sacramento was, on foot, what, a day’s trek, maybe two? Less if he could hitchhike.

In the backseat of the Griffin, Muca had piled in practically everything she could steal from the kitchen, looked like. Packets of raw chicken were already festering in the sun, still sealed in shrinkwrap. An entire smashed carton of eggs was splattered all across the passenger side. Cabbages. Carrots. Some strange fruit he forgot the name to that came from the jungles of Sumatra.

Oh, look at that, a miniature cortex disruptor from the experimental vault. Nice catch, Muca.

“Tell me what’s going on, Zak,” Francis said, his tone softening. “The sooner we resolve this mess, the sooner we can all go home.”

“What’s going on is ‘none of your business,’” Zak snapped back. “I had a bad day, took the Griffin out for a spin, and did not stick the landing. As you can see.”

“You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?”

“And _you_ don’t actually expect me to believe you’re just down here to ‘check in.’” He turned around, the mini-disruptor in hand, stance widening. “What’s your ulterior, Francis? If you’re down here it means there must be something _really_ juicy in it for you. I wonder what that is.”

Francis’s fingers went up to the sonic collar around his neck. “You really don’t want to jump to any hasty conclusions, Zak. Is it so hard to believe I might have a vested interest in not having to interact with you any more than I have to?”

“No, it isn’t,” Zak replied, “which is exactly how I know that you ARE talking to me right now because you think you’ll get something out of it.”

“…Hm,” Francis said, his neutral expression finally twisting into a smirk. “I suppose I take back what I said before. You _have_ gotten smarter than the last time I saw you.”

Zak’s voice lowered into a growl – a threat. “Go home.”

“Make me.”

Zak drew his weapon and fired.

With a trained efficiency, Francis moved just a few inches to the left to dodge the beam with only a half-inch to spare, before lunging to the side and firing off a sonic blast. Zak was already anticipating it, however, and was already well out of the way by the time it hit, putting some distance between them, as they both ran along the even rows of trees. In between the wooden trunks he fired off shot after shot, bright blue arcing through the branches and always _just barely missing_ their target.

“Stop jumping around so much so I can shoot you,” Zak grumbled.

“What’s wrong, Zak? Out of practice? Can’t help but notice that that little headache problem of yours seems to have cleared itself up.” God, even his _voice_ was punchable.

But as much as Zak wanted to bite out a retort, he WAS out of practice. At the very least, that was going to be the excuse he would use, since this was getting downright embarrassing. His aim was still good, but whatever training the People were putting Francis through, it was working wonders.

At least Zak still had the upper hand in sheer endurance. Split-second evasions like that were a drain on stamina – Zak knew this from experience. He just had to tire Francis out a little, bit by bit. The jumpy little bastard could only keep it up for so long.

So they continued to trade shots between the trees, the lizards and birds scattering from the sound of gunfire and supersonic blasts that never hit their marks, their feet kicking up dust and pebbles as they skidded, twisted, dodged, and ran. The exertion was starting to wear on the both of them, until finally Francis seemed to be slowing down, the sweat on his pale skin leaving small dark spots in the dirt wherever they fell. Yeah, just like that.

Ready, aim…

The trigger clicked, but no bolt shot out. A red light was flashing on the back panel of the gun when Zak glanced down, teeth snapping shut in frustration.

Out of power. How could it already be out of power?!

“Frick.”

Francis raised an eyebrow. “Only thirty shots?”

“I guess that’s why it’s experimental,” Zak said, holstering it on his belt loop and pulling the Claw out in one motion. That was fine. Whatever. He could deal with it. He was better at hand-to-hand anyways! And Francis’s smug grin looked like it needed a good beating.

Francis took the invitation, taking just one moment to gather himself before lunging straight through the few trees in between them. Just as they were about to meet –

A flash of red and black, and it was only Francis’s training that saved him from death by impalement at the business end of an ancient, faded greatspear.

Zak couldn’t believe his eyes. “Muca…”

“I – I’ll protect you with my life!” She’d already pulled the spear back out of the ground, at the ready, waiting for Francis to make another move, her tail twitching with a nervous energy. Zak had completely forgotten about her in the midst of his scuffle with Francis – and about how fast she could move over uneven terrain.

But that wasn’t the most surprising thing about her appearance. No – what was most surprising was what she was wearing. On her hands, to keep her safe from the greatspear’s magical ward against snakes…

“…You stole mom’s oven mitts!” Zak shouted.

“I stole many more things than that!” She yelled back.

Francis just let out an appreciative hum. “A naga, is it? …Tsk tsk. Zakarya J. Saturday, what _have_ you gotten yourself into.”

“When we kill him,” Muca said, trying to put on a false display of bravado despite her obvious terror, “will I be allowed to eat him?”

“Wh – no!” Zak tried to shove her out of the way. “No one’s eating anyone!”

He glanced down at the disruptor – it was recharging in the sunlight, but slowly – he had maybe one shot on it. Two at best.

“Th…then…the killing?” She seemed terribly confused. “We are killing this one, right?”

“No!”

Francis interjected in a mock-pleasant tone. “That’s a little naïve, don’t you think?”

“ _You_ ,” Zak said, pointing at him, “can shut up. And YOU,” this time directed at the naga, “can go _home_. In fact, how about we _all_ go home.”

“That’s not happening, and you’re stupid for suggesting it,” Francis said.

“My home is wherever you are, Just Zak,” Muca said.

“I hate both of you so much,” Zak said.

Francis just shrugged. “Well, since we are all in agreement – “

“Secret attack!” Muca yelled. “Metal eggs!”

“Metal what?” Francis asked.

Zak screamed, the last sound they heard before the flash-bang of the explosions going off.

“The one who stole Doyle’s stun grenades was YOU?!”

…Ringing in his ears.

First that, then his other senses, one-by-one coming back online. The dirt beneath his palms, the grass between his fingers. The spots in his vision clearing as he blinked at the sky between the leaves. The dull ache from every battered, bruised bone in his body.

And, slowly becoming apparent, the sound of shouting just a short distance away from him. He heaved himself back into a sitting position, exhausted and drained of energy, watching Muca and Francis trade blows.

Or, rather, watching Francis deliver blows the snake was barely able to keep up with, the thick leather of his gloves thudding off the wood of Sharur’s handle with every hit. Every instant their weapons met pushed Muca back just a few inches closer to Zak, until she was standing her ground close enough for Zak to make out the individual scales running down her back.

He hated this.

He hated being the target, he hated people trying to protect him, he hated people pinning so much hope on him only to throw themselves away for his sake.

And if ANYONE was going to get the privilege of beating Francis’s face in, it was going to be _him_ , and _not Muca_.

Gritting his teeth, digging his heels into the ground, he grabbed the claw and lunged for an opening as Francis drew back for a strike. Surprised at the sudden attack, Francis had to dodge to get out of the way, the first opening he’d had the entire fight.

As the end of the claw whiffed, Zak and Muca shared a glance. Quickly, she took advantage of the opening Zak had created, swinging the other end of the spear toward Francis’s head.

His arms came up to block the blow, but he felt it under the thick cloth of his coat, and staggered. Thinking fast, he used the momentum to distance himself, the tip of Zak’s follow-through snagging on the end of his coat as he went.

All three of them were breathing hard, and it was hard to tell who was in the worst shape. Between them, Muca had the biggest advantage in base strength, a naga’s body and reflexes, but she was seriously untrained, and both Zak or Francis could easily handle her. Meanwhile, Zak was beaten badly from the day’s prior events...and Francis was outnumbered. Even two-on-one, this could be anyone’s fight.

Problem was, it wasn’t _anyone_ ’s fight. This was between him and Francis.

Zak stepped forward, and, reading his cue, Muca drew back. Francis was rubbing his arms where the spear had hit, glowering and ready to respond to any move Zak might make, the two of them circling each other, waiting for the first strike.

“The sad thing is, by resisting this much you’ve already proven to me both that you’re a part of whatever’s going on, AND that you know my People will want a slice,” Francis growled. “I don’t want THEM finding out any more than you do. Think using your whole brain instead of just your pituitary, for once!”

“Like I’m gonna buy that,” Zak spat back. “If that was the case, I’m sure you’d find a way to futz with the data back on your home planet.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“It’s what you guys do for a living.”

Francis raised his fists again. “Seems like we’re doing this the hard way, then.”

“Good,” Zak said, and charged.

They met with the dull sound of metal against leather, or whatever kind of padded armor Francis had on under his coat. So, him rubbing his arms like they hurt – that’d been a show, after all. God, could Francis ever do _anything_ without tricks, without his shady manipulation?

Francis was trained to move on split-second reactions. One fight with him like this, and Zak could tell – every block, every dodge, every shift of balance was masterful. He predicted Zak’s moves with ease, analyzing Zak’s patterns, the way he moved his body. Finding the patterns, moving for a swift neutralization.

Good.

Fighting cryptids was nothing like fighting humans. Mom used to say, during sparring matches, that sometimes beginners could get a few lucky hits in against veterans, because veterans became accustomed to certain movements, and the random flailing of a new student was unpredictable.

Cryptids were like new students, mixed with deadly speed and an arsenal of nature’s greatest defenses. So Zak had been trained in his mother’s native Lion’s Roar; he’d been drilled in Xiao Lin and Tae Kwon Do, but he’d learned just as much from his parents as he did mother nature herself. Twitchy animals that could read every subconscious signal your body could send, with hidden claws and venom fangs, a wildness that made people...tame.

It wasn’t hard to make Francis think he had the upper hand. His ego was big enough to block out the sun. All Zak had to do was pause a half-second longer after every blow, pretend like all his dodges were lucky breaks, let a couple smaller passes land.

If Zak had practiced only martial arts, he’d lose. If he’d only perfected his stances and techniques, then Francis would have an advantage so wide the battle would have been lost before it’d even begun. Whatever standards the People held him to must have been near perfection; Francis already moved like an old master, efficiently – effortlessly – redirecting Zak’s momentum, controlling the flow of the battle.

That was how Zak trapped him. He let himself get knocked “off-balance” and feigned an opening he knew Francis couldn’t resist, flailing with his claw to keep Francis’s attention away from the empty hand reaching for his belt. Francis didn’t even notice the miniature cortex disruptor until it had been pinned against his chest, staring at it with disbelief.

"When did you..."

“Night-night,” Zak said, cheerfully, and pulled the trigger, the lightning blue flash sparking all across Francis’s body, leaving him a crumpled heap on the ground. His muscles spasmed a couple timed and fell still.

Finally, Zak let himself relax, hunching over and clutching his ribcage where he’d let Francis hit him. A reckless tactic, maybe, but when had Zak Saturday been anything but? The disruptor being experimental and all, he didn’t expect its stun effect to last very long. Better to leave while he still could, get a head start and lose the grey man in the crowd of Sacramento.

He only managed to hobble a few steps away before something caught his foot and tripped him, the claw flying out of his grasp.

“That was…unpleasant,” Francis said, yanking Zak back into the ring. He looked frazzled by the blast, his normally smooth hair sticking out at odd angles, his breath harsh and ragged through his nose, but he was nowhere near incapacitated.

Fuck experimental equipment. Fuck whatever kind of armor Francis was wearing that messed with the pulse.

Zak raised the disruptor again, only for Francis to grab his wrist and torque it, forcing Zak’s grip open as he bit down on his cheek so as not to yell out in pain. He brought his free leg up and kicked against Francis’s chest, forcing him back a couple paces, giving Zak just enough time to struggle back to his feet.

Francis growled and lunged at Zak’s throat, angry like Zak had never seen him.

But without a weapon, Zak was at a disadvantage, and they both knew it. His body was probably tougher than Francis’s, but it wasn’t covered in Kevlar, and it had already been exhausted from nonstop days of beatdown after brutal beatdown.

He braced himself for the hit, but it didn’t come; at the last moment, Muca had charged in with Sharur, pushing Francis aside.

“You…will have to go through me!”

He stumbled but didn’t lose his balance, his expression twisting with frustration, and he changed his priority.

“Fine.”

Poor Muca didn’t even know what hit her. Within seconds, Sharur was ripped out of her grasp, and Francis had her pinned against a tree by her neck, the writhing of her body useless against his grip.

“Last I remember," he snarled, "the Nagas were firmly on the ‘threat’ side of the threat calculation index. Does this make me the ‘good guy’ in this scenario?”

“Gkkrkrk,” Muca gurgled.

“Get away from her!” Zak yelled, scraping out just enough energy from his battered body to run at him. He tackled Francis down, Muca crumpling to the ground coughing and sputtering, her claws scratching against the dented scales.

Francis kicked the Saturday off, and Zak fell, winded and out of breath.

“This is it, Zak,” Francis said, crouching down and lunging for him.

 _This can’t be it,_ Zak thought, glaring. Letting the instinct he’d honed from years in the field take over, his fingers found the worn shaft of Sharur, and, with the last ounce of strength in his body, with Francis bearing down on him, he struck.

Without even realizing it, he’d thrust it in Francis’s direction speartip-first. Francis, with his rigorously trained instincts, managed to dodge, but, exhausted from the protracted battle, he wasn’t fast enough to move his head completely out of the way; the edge of the rusted spear cut the side of his cheek as it moved, its dull edge wetting with Francis’s blood.

He stumbled and fell, hitting the dirt with both hands, immediately rolling to the side in case Zak or Muca was trying to take advantage of the opening, only to find that neither of them had moved. Instead, they were staring at something, transfixed, and Francis turned to see what was going on.

The moment the head had had sliced Francis open, the weapon jumped to life in Zak’s hands, ripping itself away into the air. The greatspear Sharur was now glowing a brilliant white, levitating, floating three feet off the ground with the tip pointed towards the earth. Around them, the wind had deadened, like the world was holding its breath, waiting.

And then, Sharur fell, like an invisible hand was stabbing it into the ground, driving the spearpoint all the way down to the matted fur where it joined the wood, the white light burning itself into the ground in an outward design, leaving a scorched pattern in its wake. Zak scrambled out of the way as the drawing etched itself into the soil, the white light flowing out of the spear like water, flowing outwards to an ancient scrawl in a ring around the design, before dissipating into the breeze.

Francis’s eyebrows had raised high enough to just about leave his head.

“Spears…don’t…do that,” he said.

Zak just let himself slump to the ground in a small puff of dust.

“Oh man. You can tell I’ve had a bad week, since this is actually only the _fourth_ weirdest thing that’s happened to me so far.”

Muca dragged herself over to look.

“Oh dear,” she said, sitting back on her coils.

“Can you read that, Muca?” he asked, poking at the words that had been burnt into the ground.

“Yes,” she said, nervously. “But I don’t like it. Oh, no. I don’t like it very much a lot.”

Francis decided to ignore the two idiots, pacing around it in a circle, his original objective forgotten. This – whatever this was – this was definitely more important.

 “It’s a map,” he said to himself. “But what’s that language written on the outside?”

 “Ancient Sumerian,” Zak answered. “I wish mom was here, she can read it way better than me. I sort of recognize some of it…”

“This, we should destroy it immediately,” Muca said, clenching her fists. “Just Zak, this is a danger to your eventual rightful reign! It is an affront to your power!”

“Is it, now.” Francis was smiling to himself. “How so?”

“Muca, shut up,” Zak hissed.

“…Oh. I said too much. Well, being alive was pleasant but I do not mind paying for my transgressions!”

Francis just made a pompous “hmph” noise, arms crossed and fingers tapping on his sleeve with a little impatience.

“So, ‘Just Zak,’” he said, “let me see if I have the gist of the situation. Your powers are back, and they threaten all of humanity – _again_. And you were forced on the run because of it. Not by your parents, no; those people would fight for you even if you grew six arms and started eating puppies for breakfast. And not the Secret Scientists, because if it were _them,_ my People would already know. And now this,” he gestured to the map still burned into the ground, “whatever it is, apparently holds some key to saving the world from you. How’s my aim?”

The fact that Zak refused to look at him was answer enough.

Francis’s hand went to his chin as he considered the options. Right now, there were the three of them in the clearing: one in a long series of superspy clones, one embodiment of the ultimate evil, and a naga hatchling wearing goofy flower-print oven mitts. Zak’s family was unaccounted for, likely because some unknown force or faction had separated him from them. That force couldn’t be the Secret Scientists; if it were, Francis’s People would know. But then, who? The nagas? But surely, if it was them, there’d be more than just this whelp. The Nagas were on file as moving as a unit.

“I think,” he said, one he’d decided his course, “we should have the Naga tell us what this map says.”

Zak raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you could think.”

Francis pretended not to notice the comment. “If this can get rid of the Kur problem, then there’s no reason for the People to intervene, which means there’s no reason for me to stick around. If it can’t, then it’s back to fighting in the dirt like animals. There’s literally no disadvantage for you. Surely you can understand _that_.”

Zak rolled his eyes, but Francis was right. Part of him thought it might be a moot point – it was probably another “cure” like the Flute of Gilgamesh had been, where getting rid of his powers only came at the cost of his own life.

“Muca, you said you could read it. What does it say?”

“Bad things,” she said, quietly, muffled behind the oven mitts. “I…I do not…is it an order to read it aloud?”

It was only natural she was hesitating, if it really was a “cure” like he was expecting. But – even if it was just a way to bide a bit more time to recover his breath – on the tiniest, slightest chance that Gilgamesh had left behind a miracle – he also had to know.

“Yeah. It’s an order.”

The naga gulped, and then, slowly slithering around to the first passage, she began to translate.

“ _Child of Humanity, proven by blood,_  
            _Who has sought for my guidance, I bestow it upon you._  
_I, Gilgamesh, king of men, give you Sharur,_  
            _And, with its blade, the remnants of my will._

“ _At each of these locations, drive Sharur into the earth._  
            _Let it drink from the vitality beneath the soil._  
_These energies, when gathered, in number, five,_  
            _Will grant you the power that you must seek._

“ _Driven through the Serpent, Sharur will cauterize its soul, and,_  
            _Without wounding the flesh, will banish its Flame._  
_Leaving it naught but a Snake, to be judged by the hands of_  
            _Humanity. That from whence we came._

_“For this grave task, I name you my heir._

_“May Sharur protect you;_  
_May your conviction guide you._

 _“May your feet walk always of the wind, on solid earth._ ”

Everyone had fallen silent save the chirping of birds, the wind in the leaves, two minds scrabbling to understand what they had just heard.

Muca rubbed her neck awkwardly. “Or something like that. I tried to preserve the nuance of the original language…”

“…Well, Zak. It looks like you found your out.”

Zak was still shocked, only able to nod dumbly. “Yeah.”

What little he could make out matched with what Muca had said, so he found no reason to doubt her reading. More importantly…

“’Without wounding the flesh’…Does that mean I don’t have to die for it to work?”

“It seems so,” Muca said, sadly. “This is a blasphemy beyond all possible blasphemies…the humans truly know nothing of shame.”

“If I…if I show this to the Lemurians, then…”

Francis quirked an eyebrow at the name, but didn’t say anything. Muca was already shaking her head.

“Those…have never listened to reason. I, Muca, would not trust them to assist you. Why gamble on a human’s attempt to strip a deity of its divinity when they could guarantee safety with their own hands? They are not our allies, Just Zak.” She seemed to realize she was lecturing him, and immediately shrunk back into a submissive posture. “…Th…that is how I would counsel you.”

Zak’s hands curled in the dirt, but he found himself inclined to believe her words. A part of him (though it was a part he wanted to pretend didn’t exist) agreed with her assessment of the Lemurians’ personalities. To be honest…if their first thought regarding his family was that he’d somehow brainwashed them into helping him, then he didn’t think they would be very willing to help him here.

But as he picked out the major landmasses from the map – the Koreas, the tip of Florida, the island of Madagascar – something else dawned on him.

He didn’t have transportation. Each location on the map was in a different continent, and one even looked like it was in the middle of the ocean; with the Griffin totaled and the airship stationed who-knows-where, how could he even make it to the HQ to get a new ride, much less fly out to the middle of China?

…But maybe…well…

He didn’t like it, but he and Muca couldn't have been the only ones to have travelled to Sacramento by air.

“You’ve been pretty quiet about this, Francis. What are you thinking?”

Francis chose his words carefully. “I’m thinking…that you need a lift.”

“Well, if you’re offering…”

“I’m not,” he said, tersely. “To be completely honest, I’m already tired of dealing with you. Now that the risk assessment is over, I can go _home_.”

“That’s all I need,” Zak said. “A ride home. Then I can grab something out of our hangar and be on my way. We’re in Sacramento, so it’ll only be an hour or two…”

He got up and made for the spear, gingerly stepping over the map. But when his hand reached out to touch it...

“Ow!” he yelped, dropping it like it’d burned him. And, indeed, it had: the skin on his palm where he’d grabbed and pulled it out of the ground was red, puffy. He immediately put it to his mouth, sucking it clean before it could get infected.

“Disgusting,” Francis commented.

“Shuh uhp.” He shook his hand out, the wound still stinging. “It didn’t do _that_ before.”

“It did to me,” Muca said, cheerfully. She held up her hands, with the oven mitts on. “That is why I stole these.”

The spear had rolled to Francis’s feet, and, curious, he picked it up. Through the leather of his gloves, it didn’t seem to have any effect on him.

…This warranted testing.

He pulled the glove off his left hand, holding it in his right, aware that all eyes were on him. He pressed a finger against the wooden shaft.

Nothing.

Two fingers. Nothing. Three? Still nothing. Four, then five, and then he was holding it in his left hand, rolling the wood between his naked fingers. It felt…warm, a little too warm, like if he closed his eyes and listened very hard, he could hear it breathing.

“It…almost feels like it’s alive,” he mused aloud.

Zak let himself collapse back into a squat on the ground, tired. “It probably is. Old stuff like that…mom would say it’s full of magic from here to heaven.”

“How scientific of her.”

“That’s what dad would say.”

“So the spear has a mind of its own. Fantastic. What does that mean in practical terms?”

“You are the heir,” Muca said, raising a little. “The heir Gilgamesh named. It is said only Gilgamesh was able to wield Sharur in the days he was alive…”

“…No,” Zak said, furiously shaking his head. “Nuh-uh. You’re not telling me I have to work together with _Francis_ to visit all these places.”

“Is that what being named ‘heir’ would mean?” Francis asked, horror creeping into his voice.

“Most likely!” Muca chirped. “These places, from the description, seem to be areas with high concentrations of natural power. Our kind refer to them as huaca. It may not be possible to enter without that damnable human’s blessing! That is to say, you!”

“Zak,” Francis said, through grit teeth, “what have you gotten me into?”

“What have _I_ gotten you into?” Zak snapped, angry. “I don’t want you to be a part of this any more than you do! I don’t even know why you’re _here_. But if you’re the only one that can do it, you’ve gotta. Because, if you don’t, then it’s gonna be a lot more than just a spanking from Epsilon at stake.”

The two stared each other down, neither willing to budge an inch. _What are you gonna do about it?_ Zak thought, tired and exhausted and absolutely not willing to put up with Francis any longer, and eventually Francis broke his gaze, giving an angry sigh and jamming his hands in his pockets, Sharur tucked under an arm.

“…Fine. I’ll think about it. We can stay the night in Sacramento – in _different rooms_ – and decide what to do tomorrow.”

Zak looked like he was about to protest, but Francis cut him off by holding up his hand.

“ _If_ I am going to be a part of this…’adventure,’ then I’ll need to know everything _you_ know. And if you’re going to be sitting in _my_ ship for any extended period of time, you need a shower. _At least_ a shower.” He glared at Muca. “ _Both_ of you. I won’t budge on this.”

Zak glared at him, too tired and hungry to fight him on the terms.

"Fine," he said. “You’re paying."

 

* * *

 

The door to Zak’s room swung open with a soft click, and Francis tucked the thin plastic card he had specifically for opening doors back into his wallet. Maybe if they’d stayed somewhere ritzy, it wouldn’t be so easy to shimmy the lock, but Zak hadn’t fought him about choosing a middling-level motel in the outskirts of the city, and all it took was jiggling the latch a little and the door popped right open.

Now then.

Lemurians, Gilgamesh, Nagas, and Kur…none of it was particularly important, was it? Here were the facts, as Francis understood them:

1: Zak was an uncontrolled threat to the world at large, until he gained control,  
2: There was definitely something Zak wasn’t telling him, something that made him more determined than Francis had ever seen him to lock his own powers away, and  
3: It was hideously easy to slip something in Zak’s drink, and it should have already kicked in.

The naga, Muca, had been told to sleep outside. After all, it wasn’t exactly like they could just check her in. She didn’t seem to have any problem with it, especially after Francis had gotten Zak to ask her, and being in a major human settlement seemed to unnerve her anyways.

So Francis was… _quite_ surprised to find her in Zak’s room, hidden around the corner, two big red eyes staring at him.

Immediately, Francis put his hands up in surrender, backing away. He could take the naga in a fight and they both knew it, but that wasn’t his goal. No, his goal was...

His eyes fell on the bed in the room, its covers disturbed, but no one underneath.

“…Funny,” Francis said. “The zolpidem should have him out like a light. And you aren’t supposed to be here.”

“Um…Francis. That was it, your name, was it? Or is that your title?”

She seemed nervous, definitely not gearing up for an attack.

“…It’s…my name,” he said, wondering how much Zak would have told this creature. He didn’t seem to be on too good of terms with her, despite the obvious worship she seemed to hold for him.

She didn’t seem to notice the hesitation in his voice. Frankly, she didn’t _seem_ to notice much of anything, but somehow Francis had the hunch that she was more competent than she appeared to be. After all, she translated the map with room to spare for “nuance,” and the records indicated that nagas were cunning as a species. She’d introduced herself as a historian, and had already won over Zak’s trust, for the most part…so Francis refused to let down his guard.

“Then, yes, Francis, I was told to expect you? And to, erm, direct you to the roof.”

She gestured to the open window, the fire escape outside. Francis walked over and peered out, watching Muca out the corner of his eyes.

“ _It_ waits for you,” she said, quietly. “I would not…be slow.”

Ominous.

He registered the feeling and discarded it, his feet meeting the black wrought-iron without a sound, practiced and quiet.

And what was waiting for him at the top was Zak, of course. There wasn’t really anything else Francis was expecting.

But the Zak Saturday he had on file was not the kind to be lounging leisurely on a motel roof at 1:48 am, closing the email app on his communicator, after having taken an adult dosage of Ambien. Francis had never seen him this calm before.

“ _Look up,_ ” it said, pointing towards the sky. ” _Tell me what you see._ ”

Francis did as asked, careful not to let his guard down. The night air was cool, even through his coat, and even at this hour the sound of distant traffic rumbled on through the night. A train sounded, miles and miles away.

“There’s a full moon,” Francis said, unsure what else he was supposed to be looking at.

“ _Yes,_ ” said whatever was using Zak’s body. “ _The full moon, and nothing else. The city lights hold all the stars at bay._ ”

Francis kept his cool, hands jammed in his pockets. He could already basically guess what it was that was sitting in front of him – a being inestimably colder than he was, ancient beyond reckoning.

The Serpent, huh.

“I hardly believe you called me up here to ask me to go stargazing.”

It laughed, humorless. “ _It seems ‘my’ predictions regarding you were accurate enough. Very well: why did you enter my room tonight?_ ”

Francis kept his expression closed, but his mind was whirring. He deduced that the question was rhetorical, and that this was very much not someone – or something – he wanted to get caught lying to.

Better to stay quiet. Though he couldn’t see its expression in the night, the Serpent was surely smiling.

“ _Heir to Gilgamesh: neither you nor your kind will be able to harness this power. There is no use in the effort._ ”

What a confident statement. True, should his People obtain Zak for themselves, bending his power to their purposes was absolutely what they had in mind – whether through persuasion, coercion, or worse. Now Francis had the feeling the first two wouldn’t work.

“Argost managed. So can we.”

“ _And where is the yeti now?_ ”

Francis glowered. “Ripped from existence, according to our files. We won’t make his mistake.”

“ _If your ‘files’ aren’t even capable of answering such a simple question, then they are of no use to you, fool._ ” It turned, the cold, unnatural orange burning in its eyes sending an involuntary chill down Francis’s spine, though he refused to show it.

He pursed his lips. _Meaning that Argost must be alive_ , a disquieting thought on its own, but right now…right now there was a bigger threat before him. It stared him down like it was peering into his soul, behind the layers and layers of self-control. He refused to show it fear.

“ _Perhaps_ ,” it mused, ” _I should ask this instead: what use will there be for an organization that directs the world governments, when there are no governments to direct?”_

Francis’s fist clenched just a little tighter, a lapse in control he would surely be disciplined for, if Epsilon or the others were watching. _What’s stopping you?_ He wanted to ask, but the better question was always _how do you benefit?_

Of course, the Serpent may just be trying to bluff him out. With as catastrophic a threat as the existence of Kur – not as in Zak, but as in a “Kur” like the old legends, entirely willing to use the weapons at his disposal – the fact that no such movement had been made was a red flag on its own. If it hadn’t moved, it was likely it _couldn’t_ move; if it _couldn’t_ move, then it was likely trying to trick Francis into leaving it alone.

But when he met the Serpent’s gaze, he became convinced that was not the case. This was not a creature of treachery and cunning, but one of such magnanimous weight that neither cunning nor treachery ever needed to be employed.

Then…

“…I am correct in assuming that killing you now will do nothing for me.”

A threat on this scale had to be neutralized immediately, one way or another. At the very least, it couldn’t be ignored, but something about its calm confidence told Francis that it had little, if anything, to fear.

“ _Those born of the magic of the earth shall always return in time,_ ” it said. “ _The fenghuang breathes, flaps, dies, and breathes again. The Lemurians were rent from this earth by Naga fang, but see: they walk once more. So it is with us all._ ”

Behind his goggles, Francis narrowed his eyes. In other words, Kur – all cryptids – seemed to have immortality, of a sort. Reincarnation may be a better word. It seemed like a hefty secret to give out so freely, something hard to believe and heavy.

And still, he did not know how the Serpent benefitted.

“You almost sound like you want me to run Sharur’s gauntlet,” he said, emotionlessly.

“ _The one who loses forfeits their rights to ask the winner’s favor,_ ” it replied, just as cool. “ _Gilgamesh was the victor; I shall respect his will, and the one he has named his heir._ _To a point._ ”

Ah, a catch.

“ _In roughly two month’s time there will be a blue moon. On that auspicious day, I shall consume my human aspect. At that point, I shall be born anew…and all debts owed will be cleared._ ”

In the end, it was a stupid sense of honor that had kept the Serpent from moving? Somehow, that didn’t seem right. Rather, it felt like there were many secrets being held, both by and from himself, and it unsettled him.

“…In other words, on that day, I’ll be your first target.”

The Serpent gave another hollow laugh, not denying the statement.

“ _A self-serving point of view._ ”

“I am a self-serving person. That’s why we’re having this conversation.”

“ _Hm_.”

Like it was being gracious, the Serpent turned away, allowing Francis time to consider his options.

This was definitely a new perspective to his situation. Most pressingly, there was the use of the word “consume,” and the fact that this… _thing_ had only manifested as a result of the influx of memories that came with the initial contact Zak had with Sharur. Even if the People were to use Argost’s methods of transferring the power, there was no guarantee that this identity would not stay behind.

And if the zolpidem hadn’t been able to subdue the identity, then it was likely it transcended chemical responses, somehow. Meaning cryogenic stasis may not even be enough to hold it.

The space station would be safe, since as far as anyone knew, they were several miles above the range of the atmospheric jellyfish, and there was nothing else in Kur’s arsenal that could touch them. But…even if the atmospheric jellyfish were the only things in range, it could still spell disaster for the organizations the People watched.

Zak’s capabilities during the cryptid war were terrifying enough. Instantaneous communication of all senses across the planet, from multiple sources, directing a global effort with just his mind and a couple cans of an energy drink. It wouldn’t be exaggerating to say it was the kind of power that could destroy the humans as a species, even with all their technological advancements. If Zak struck at a few key locales, at a few key people…Francis knew intimately just how fragile the world’s governments were.

An optimistic estimate for how long the humans could stand a chance was a month. A realistic one was closer to a fortnight.

The most frustrating aspect of this conundrum – second to having to work in close proximity to Zak Saturday – was the vague mysticism that surrounded and obfuscated every aspect of the problem. A hero’s quest delivered by ancient spear? A looming evil in the form of a million-year-old evil personality? The arbitrary time limit set to the blue moon? In a word, ridiculous. It was like grappling an enemy without a form, trying to catch the fog with nothing but your bare hands.

At least with Zak, the People could take their time, since the boy himself was so reluctant to use his powers to their fullest. There would be no such mercy with this being at the helm.

So there was really only one course available to him. Until he had more information, he had to play along with the game.

“Until the blue moon, you say. You won’t interfere?”

“ _I keep my promises,_ ” it said, coldly. “ _My human aspect will do as he will._ ”

“It’s not a lot of time,” Francis said.

“ _Do not barter with me, Child of Humanity. Until the blue moon. That is as long as my fangs will wait._ ”

There were, of course, many things Francis wanted to ask, but it seemed the conversation was over, as the Serpent turned back to the sky, untouched by the concrete, the city, the concerns of the mortal world.

“It’s a deal, then,” Francis said, retreating.

An ancient snake, powerful enough to have been considered a god. Mysticism that could be taken for magic, and a deadline that loomed over him as the light of the moon. The nagging hunch that the situation was much more complex than the Serpent tried to make it appear; the disquiet that came with how far off the rails his train had jumped.

But that didn’t matter; what mattered was how Francis would face it. And, on the way down the fire escape, his rigid self-control relaxing, he made himself a pledge.

Whatever happened, he _would_ come out of it the victor. That was what Epsilon would do, that was what the _People_ would do, and that was what every Francis that ever came before him would do. There was no situation that could not be profited from, there was no existence that could not be made useful.

So long as he made it out alive…he’d make it out on top.

Failure was not an option.

 

* * *

 

 

Last time Doyle had to break into the Saturday HQ, it’d been with Van Rook and the cheapest grenades money could buy. This time, he had only Zon and the jetpack on his back.

And the passcode to the front gate. Which made the whole thing a little easier.

It’d been one night since the Lemurians had captured the rest of the family as they fell out the front of the airship, Doyle and Zon just barely managing to escape the eagles. Doyle had tried to help his sister, brother-in-law, get them out there, but when he’d gotten close, Drew had just grabbed him by the shoulders and yelled over the wind for him to find Zak, find whoever was piloting the Griffin, save him.

The parents…they’d be alright. Even as a mercenary working under Van Rook he’d known about the Saturdays; it seemed there was nothing they couldn’t survive. With his luck, he’d find them already inside the house, searching the same avenues he was. Maybe they’d even have a lead.

In the end, he couldn’t catch up to the Griffin, and it’d flown over the horizon and out of sight. Later, when he’d found the wreckage by following the news, all that was nearby was a big circle of overturned dirt, and footprints already blowing away in the wind.

With the airship captured, he had practically no access to the Saturday’s information net. All he really had to go on was predictions and hunches – never a great place to start. The world was a big place, and it was easy to get lost in it.

Still, at least there were some solid stones he had yet to turn. Zak, if he was still able to communicate at all, might have sent his parents a text or something. Doyle didn’t exactly…keep a constant contact number, so it’d have to be to his parents – and Doyle knew for a fact that all the Saturday systems were interconnected, that if it showed up on their parents’ communicators, it’d show up on their computer at home.

He just hoped the Lemurians didn’t know that.

But when he opened the front door to the house itself, something immediately struck him as…off. The feeling he’d get when someone had rummaged through his fridge, moved the milk to the other side to get to the seafood leftovers from last night. An unsettling feeling of things being out of place, but this time, the culprit wasn’t so obvious. Zon chittered nervously at his side, mirroring his sentiment.

Someone had been here, and recently. He just hoped they were friendly.

“Give me a perimeter check, Jurassic. I’ll signal for you.”

She nodded and took off, Doyle watching her ascent until she was a little black dot in the sky. Then he stepped inside the house, closing the door behind him.

He powered up his wrist blaster, holding it at the ready in front of him as he made his way through the abode, peering around the corners. There were signs the place had been lived in recently, but it’d only been about two days since the family had left for Wales, so it wasn’t like there had been time for the dust to settle. Still, the prickling at the back of Doyle’s neck told him he wasn’t alone, and Fisk wasn’t the only one in the family with sharp instincts.

He made it to the communications room without incident, and logged into the system using Doc’s password. Doc didn’t know that he knew what it was, but it didn’t exactly take a genius to guess it, knowing the number of characters and that it ended with Drew’s birthday.

Once the system loaded, he double-clicked the email app and started to root around. Being as prominent as they were, the Saturday’s inbox was full of newsletters and issues asking their attention, most of the problems inconsequentially small or obviously hoaxes. He scrolled through, holding his breath as he scanned the subject/sender lines, until he hit the jackpot: sent at 1:47 am, a subject line reading “CONTINGENCY,” with the sender marked as Zak Saturday, sent from his communicator.

…Marked as “read.”

Before he could click it open, he heard the sound of a footstep and whipped around, finding himself staring down a laser gun like from a cheap 80’s sci-fi flick. He’d make a quip if it wasn’t aimed for his head, and if he didn’t recognize the man standing behind it.

A man in a steel-grey suit, black hair kept short in an undercut, with pink glasses pushed all the way up to his eyebrow ridge. Doyle knew him from the few scuffles he’d been with the rest of the family after the first Kur incident, their first meeting taking place during the Paris meltdown. Dr. Beeman – Doyle could remember his name because it’d sounded funny.

Well, he wasn’t very funny right now.

“Thirty-six-point-five-eight hours ago,” the scientist began, “the Secret Scientists get an urgent message from Doc and his girlfriend telling them to meet at 41.3099 North and 122.3106 West as soon as possible. Maybe you don’t speak coordinates; locals call it ‘Mt. Shasta.’ Twenty-six-point-two-seven hours later, a gaggle of Scientists, me included, show up. And Doc isn’t there, but you know who is? A whole pack of Fuzzy-Wuzzies, dressed up like Rome. They invite us in for a meeting.”

Doyle had his arms up, working out how he was going to get himself out of this.

“That’s where we all get debriefed about a certain someone being missing. You wouldn’t happen to know what I’m talking about, would you?”

“No,” Doyle said, “educate me.”

“I think you know him. About yea tall, haircut like a skunk, smells like five wet dogs had a party with a barrel of fish. Seems like he’s some kinda bigshot celebrity. What did they call him again…Kur?”

“You know,” Doyle said, keeping calm, “I’m pretty sure there’s a ‘no soliciting’ sign on the front gate. How ‘bout you take your weird religion to someone else’s door?”

Dr. Arthur Beeman narrowed his eyes. “I don’t think I _appreciate_ your _tone_.”

“Yeah,” Doyle said, “well. I don’t think I appreciate your face.”

Fast as he could, he kicked a metal grate at his feet into his hands, using it to deflect the blast that came at him. When he’d confirmed it worked, he charged, tackling the Scientist out of the room, the two of them crashing to the floor of the living room.

Doyle was back on his feet in an instant, fists up. When Beeman staggered to his feet Doyle was there in an instant, shoving him across the couch and twisting his gun arm behind his back, forcing the joint so hard Beeman dropped the gun.

“OW! Hey, _fragile_! Delicate instruments, careful!”

Doyle rolled his eyes and pressed down harder. He had to get this done with before reinforcements arrived.

“What do you want with Zak? And – “ he looked around. Before reinforcements arrived…but were there any? He couldn’t hear any footsteps or voices down the corridors. The halls remained as empty as when Doyle had first stepped inside. “Are you…alone?”

“Whatever keeps my head from rolling,” Beeman said, sardonicism dripping off his every word. “By the way, you look like a mercenary. What’re they paying you? Because I guarantee I can outpay them. Whoever they are. I don’t really care.” He narrowed his eyes. ”What are you doing in Doc’s house?”

“What am I doing in Doc’s house?” Doyle asked, incredulous. “What are _you_ doing in Doc’s house!?”

“Tracking a kid, _duh_. What, you’re not here for the same reason?”

Annoying. Too smart for his own good; that was Doyle’s first real impression of this man, since they’d never really had the chance to talk before. How did Zak survive being babysat by him? Doyle tightened his grip.

“I’m asking the questions.”

“Ooh, good one. Care to spit a few more clichés, Mr. Tough Guy? Here’s a request: ‘we can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way.’ I pick easy way.”

“Uh,” Doyle said, confused. “What?”

Beeman continued without taking notice. “Now that that’s settled,” he said, “feel free to get your testosto-hands off me.”

“I… _what_?”

“I SAID, I’m going to answer your questions.” If his body’s current position allowed it, Beeman would be tapping his foot in impatience. “Look: I’m unarmed, I came alone, and no one knows I’m out here. If you were on orders to kill I’d already be dead, but since you aren’t, let’s help each other out a little. I tell you what I know, and you _get your bear paws off of me_. ”

Reluctantly, Doyle let go, careful to sweep Beeman’s pistol out of his reach as he straightened his back and rubbed at his wrist, glaring balefully in Doyle’s direction.

“You’re welcome,” Doyle said, sarcastically. “Now tell me what you know.”

Beeman just sighed and sat himself down on the couch. Doyle moved to say something, but stopped himself when he realized he’d probably only get an unimpressed glare in response.

“Not much,” Beeman said. “Kid sent an email to his parents through about five proxies. Location services on all his devices are off and there’s no facial recognition matches pinging on any of my cameras; he’s about as far off the grid as he can be.”

Location services off…that was unsettling. Doyle would think Zak wanted to be found. Unless someone else was using his comm unit…

“What was in the email?” He asked.

“Honestly? Looked like a shopping list. Maybe it’s a code of some sort, but if it is, it’s an inside joke. I know ciphers when I see them, and this isn’t one.”

“I need to see it,” Doyle insisted, crossing his arms. Beeman shrugged.

“Fine. I took the liberty of forwarding it to myself.” Slowly, he reached into his jacket and pulled out a device – Doyle tensed, but it was only some sort of PDA, and when Beeman had opened the relevant document, he handed it over.

 **ZakAttack@scientiaest.ss**  
SUBJ: CONTINGENCY  
**MSSG:**  
AQUA REGIA, STORE IN SILVER  
4 OIL OF CRYPTOMERIA  
1 DIATOMACEOUS EARTH (DISSOLVED IN DEIONIZED WATER)  
2 MILK OF THE FRUIT OF THE TALIPOT PALM  
.5 SLIME OF HAGFISH  
3 COCKATRICE VENOM, CONDENSED  
4 ACID MIXTURE (1:3 NITRIC, HYDROCHLORIC)  
AZOTH, STORE IN GOLD  
2 PIRANHA SOLUTION  
6 SAP OF THE CACTUS CAT  
.5 VENOM OF ORNITHORHYNCHUS  
1 SWEAT OF NAREE PON  
1 OIL OF KIIDK’YAAS  
4 VENOM OF PAPUAN GIANT SPIDER  
.5 NECTAR OF THE GIANT HIMALAYAN LILY  
HEAT MAINTAINED BELOW 366 K, ABOVE 277 K. AZOTH AND AQUA REGIA, NEVER THE TWO SHALL MEET, UNTIL SUCH TIME AS IS APPOINTED - DISCRETION. WHAT IS CONSUMED SHALL NEVER RETURN.

Doyle narrowed his eyes. He’d been expecting a status update, even a ransom letter, but this was…practically unintelligible. A recipe of some sort?

“Does it mean anything to you?” Beeman asked. “Also, if you drop that PDA, I’m charging you for it.”

Doyle handed it back in a hurry. “No.”

“Huh,” Beeman said. He paused, and then - “by the way, why are you looking for this kid?” The question was asked out of curiosity, not suspicion. The scientist narrowed his eyes, tapped on his chin. “You seem…familiar…”

“I’m his uncle. Doyle? Blackwell? There was this big thing where I was working as a mercenary and it turned out I was related, during all that Argost stuff, like, it was this whole deal - ”

“That’s not possible,” Beeman said. “Doc doesn’t have any siblings. Hell, he doesn’t have parents.”

“On his wife’s side.”

Beeman’s eyebrows went up. “No kidding?” And then, “my god. They’re multiplying.”

“This is not the first time we’ve ever seen each other, man. Remember Paris?”

“No,” Beeman said. "Does this mean I don’t have to pay you?”

“I’m not helping you find Zak so you can turn him in to the Monkey Men,” Doyle said, his grip on the couch tightening.

Beeman only squinted further in confusion. “No, what? Why would I do that?”

“Um, because that’s basically what you tried to do to him last time. With the cryo-freeze?”

Beeman waved at him dismissively. “This and that are two different things.”

Bullshit. “Then why are you trying to find him?”

“To ask him what the hell is going on,” Beeman said, getting up. “You don’t know anything. _I_ don’t know anything. The Mystic Monkey Men from Mars seem to know something, but I hate their attitude, and I can’t hear them speaking, anyways. But that meant I had to drag Twin Peaks aside post-meeting to get all the details. Being the person with the _least_ info in the room _doesn’t happen to me,_ and I don't _like_ it.”

“What do you mean, you can’t hear them speaking? It’s telepathy, I thought the whole point was that everyone could understand it.”

Beeman knocked against the side of his head. “Faraday cage. Had it installed eighteen years ago to keep the Andalites out.”

Whatever that meant, he seemed very smug about it.

“Fara…Anda-what?”

“I have a steel cage for a skull so the aliens can’t read my thoughts. Keep up.”

“You have metal plates in your head?” Doyle asked, incredulous. “ _Why?_ ”

“ _I like my privacy_ ,” Beeman said, like it was an obvious answer. Satisfied that he’d made his point, he went back to complaining.

“The Furballs don’t even have a written language. That whole meeting was like being blind at a deaf convention. Who’d have thunk I’d have to deal with something _that_ annoying with a _terrestrial_ species…”

“Alright, alright. Just - let me get this straight,” Doyle said. “ _You_ , the guy who almost had Zak killed because Argost was also in range of the flute, don’t care that Kur is back - ”

“Kur’s back?” Beeman asked. Apparently, it was news to him.

“Shut up,” Doyle said. “I’m talking now. So – you don’t care that Kur’s back. You’re just trying to find Zak because you can’t tell what’s going on, and you’re basically acting against all the other scientists, AND the lemurians, for… _why_?”

Beeman almost looked sullen. “I like knowing things,” he said.

Doyle stared at him for a good few seconds before sighing and turning away. “So, basically, what I’m getting is that neither of us know anything. With you here, I think I know even less than before.”

“Statistically unlikely for that to be the case, just so we’re clear,” Beeman interjected.

“Yeah, whatever. And someone sent us this email using Zak’s account…it’s not a ransom or a map. The Griffin crashed near Sacramento, but that was so long ago he could be halfway across the globe by now. And if we – I – DO find him…what are you going to do?”

“Are you actually planning not to help me?” He raised his fist and pointed. “Listen, buster. You’re one guy with a Pteranodon and a jetpack – don’t think I didn’t see you come in. You’re looking for a kid who’s gone off the grid that could be anywhere on the planet right now. You need eyes. Ears. _Experience_. Who do you think it was that kept the Scientists on the Saturday’s trail? The girl with the robot? Or the guy with access to feeds from every manmade satellite in orbit that isn’t protected by a government passcode?”

Doyle just folded his arms, straightening his back to try and match Beeman’s height. What the scientist said was right, mostly – Doyle’s fighter jet was parked in the hangar, but it wasn’t exactly the kind of vehicle he should be driving on a search-and-rescue. The problem was, he couldn’t trust this guy: Arthur Beeman, whom the Saturdays had all but disowned as a friend, did not exactly ooze faithfulness or goodwill. Until he could figure out this guy’s angle – until he knew how to make this guy tick – he didn’t want to accept any help.

“If you’ve got all that fancy tech, then why are you asking to team up with me?”

Beeman paused. “Hm. Good question.” After a bit more consideration, he finally gave an answer.

“Ten percent I owe Doc. Ninety percent because I’ve had enough of swamps and tombs and all the other deathtraps the kid keep getting himself into. I’m not doing it again.”

Doyle raised an eyebrow. “Only ten?”

“Look,” Beeman snapped, defensively. “Here’s how I see it. If I find the kid and make sure he’s safe, then I square things away with Doc. If he turns out to be Kur and everything else the Marmosets are scared of, then fine. Not. My. Problem. The monkeys want to deal with him, I’ll let them. You want to go on the run with him, knock yourself out. Earth’s boned either way, and it’s run out of favors from me. I’ll just catch the next shuttle out of the Orion Spur and say some sayonara’s to Good Ol’ Blue. If we’re _not_ boned, then…you know what? I’d rather bet on the kid than Planet of the Apes.”

“Oh, really?”

Beeman huffed. “ _Why_ is that so hard to believe? You could throw a Saturday in a pit made out of starving tigers with nothing but the clothes on their back, and by the time you check up on them, they’ve skinned one and made friends with the others.”

“You were trying to put Zak in _cryo-sleep_.”

“And then he saved the world,” Beeman said, not budging an inch. “That’s how science works. I don’t like that the kid is the one with the fighting odds, but it doesn’t matter what I _like_ : if that’s what all current evidence points to, that’s where I’m putting my money. You got a problem with that?”

…Alright, Doyle may have to change his evaluation of this man.

Not that what he did was…excusable, but, then, Doyle had done his own fair share of inexcusable shit. Any judgement he made on Beeman’s moral character would have to be done with a hefty dose of pot calling the kettle black.

What he could say about Beeman was this: the man was honest. Infuriating to regular people, maybe, but next to some of the nastier clients Doyle had dealt with, Beeman was like a puff of pink air freshener.

No, honest wasn’t the right word. “Easy,” maybe. Easy to understand. Easy to bargain with. He was straightforward and direct, in a way most of Doyle’s past clients – self-serving politicians, power-hungry maniacs – could never be. Sure, Beeman might change his mind later about helping them out. But that was a risk Doyle ran if he reached out to _anyone_ besides the other members of the family.

So…why the hell not?

“I’m gonna need transportation.” He put on his negotiation voice, firmly laying out his terms. “My jet’s in the hangar, but I can’t use it if I’m going anywhere populated. I also need my expenses covered, and I’m gonna have to charge you for my services since I can’t just take a break from working for this.”

That was a lie; he’d _retire_ if it meant he could make sure Zak stayed safe, but this was a negotiation, a haggle. If at least he could get his expenses covered -

“Fair,” Beeman said. “Just send me the bill.”

\- Alright. Well, next point.

“The email doesn’t look like a clue to where Zak is, so we’re still at square one. If we’re doing this, I’ll leave the ‘search’ part of ‘search-and-rescue’ to you.”

“Already on it.”

“In the meantime…I think I’m gonna try getting everything in the email list.” If Zak – or whoever had taken Zak – had really sent it, then there must be a reason. The letter was titled “contingency”…

Contingency for…what?

He didn’t know, but if whatever-it-was rolled around, he wanted to make sure he was ready for it.

“I’ll see if I can figure out what it makes,” Beeman said. “Preliminary searches didn’t turn anything up, but…being in the Secret Scientists DOES have its perks.”

“You do that, Egghead. Which ingredient should I start with?”

“How should I know?” Beeman said, his hackles raising. Doyle raised an eyebrow, and Beeman sighed.

“…Cactus cat. We’ve gotta head back to my place first so I can lend you a vehicle, and it’s closest to where I live.”

Doyle snorted, amused.

“What?” Beeman asked.

“Nothing,” Doyle said. “So, what am I gonna be driving?”

“A reverse-engineered Drodzian scouting ship,” Beeman replied, casually. He was trying hard not to show how smug he was about it, but it bled into his voice and posture as he turned around to lead the way out. “Nuclear powered, zero radiation, g-force decompressors built into the hull. You’ll need those since it can go from zero to a hundred in three seconds, vertical.”

Doyle whistled. “I’m getting a spaceship?”

“’Reverse-engineered,’ dumbass, it’s just a replica.” Beeman stopped, and turned around, smirking.

“The original is _my_ ride,” he said.

 _Shit_ , Doyle thought, though he refused to say it out loud. _That’s cool_.

 

* * *

  

**Dx7dSc89lzw02@burnermail.cc**  
miniman, if you get this…i’m going to find you.  
have the ufo guy working with me. don’t really trust him, but seems like my best shot. just letting you know so if you see his ship you’ll know it’s me driving it. probably.  
you’re going to get through this, we’re going to bust your parents out, and we’re going to rip the lemurians a new one. stay sharp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fights! drama! beeman!
> 
> comments fuel me and give me the strength to continue. this chapter was 10.5k+ words and im dead


	13. If it's weird, check the calendar...

The too-sharp brightness of morning light suddenly flooding his brain through his eyelids was what brought Zak to a violent awakening, clutching his face and falling out of the hotel sheets and onto the floor.

“Fisk,” he groaned, “five more minutes, come on…”

“I’m afraid we don’t have the luxury,” Francis said, calmly tossing a change of clothes onto Zak’s face. That was enough to get him awake, blinking into the morning light, throwing a hate-filled glare in Francis’s direction.

“Why are you and Muca in my room?”

Muca was keeping her distance, claws fidgeting against each other as she tried to pretend she wasn’t intruding. Francis, meanwhile, just pointed up and out the window.

High, high above the city wheeled an eagle, twinkling with gold and red.

“Shit,” Zak said.

“Eloquently put,” Francis remarked. “Hurry up and get dressed. We need to come up with a plan. Now.”

Zak didn’t need to be told twice. The clothes were civilian. Touristy, even - khakis and a shirt with the word Sacramento written on it and a windbreaker. Francis explained the situation as Zak pulled them on.

“That eagle’s been patrolling for about half an hour now. The naga - er, Muca - was the one who noticed it first.”

“‘Lunch’ is the name given to the ones who cannot recognize a garuda in the sky,” Muca said.

“That means the lemurians are here?” Zak asked, hurriedly throwing the jacket on.

“Presumably,” Francis said. “But if they are, they’re not landing. Maybe because this is a populated city, maybe because they’re still searching for where your exact location.”

“That’s what the clothes are for, huh?” Zak asked, tucking his shock of white hair under his hood. “You aren’t gonna change?”

“They’re not looking for me,” Francis said, lightly. “The hotel serves breakfast. Hurry up and meet me there once all your stuff is packed. We should eat while we still can.”

“What about Muca?” Zak asked. “If you’re worried about them spotting me, she’s a lot harder to hide.”

“I will make my way to the vehicle, in secret,” she said, following Francis out the door. “You shall not worry for me! Running and hiding is my specialty.”

She closed the door behind them, and Zak was alone with his old clothes and a plain backpack Francis had tossed him. Shaking the sleep out of his limbs, he quickly put everything away, hesitating over whether or not to keep the claw on his belt loop before deciding stealth was the priority and stashing it in the pack.

Why was he so tired? Last night…

Last night, he’d talked to Francis on the roof. Or, rather, not him, but…

 _Us,_ the Serpent said. _We._

Zak shook his head, tuning the voice out.

Two months to visit every huaca. Two months to lay his power to rest. Failure meant a catastrophe on an apocalyptic scale. Yeah, he remembered now.

The deadline only filled him with more determination than before. Two months for five locations? That was plenty of time. He was in more danger of strangling Francis to death than running out the clock.

They just had to not get caught.

Everything had been stashed away, and Zak left five dollars on the counter for the tip. Finally, he grabbed his communicator, paging through the notifications on his way down the hall. Junk, junk, junk, and…

...An email from Doyle.

So Doyle had managed to escape the lemurians, even if the rest of the family hadn’t. That was a relief; it felt like a huge weight was already lifted off his shoulders.

Wait, didn’t he send Doyle an email last night, while he was half-awake? He checked his sent mail as he waited for the elevator, and tried to make sense of the message in their on the way down to the ground floor.

No, no good. A ripple of nausea washed behind his eyes.

It seemed to be a secret the Serpent was guarding; when he tried to remember what the recipe made, he felt pulled down into the Serpent’s blackness like he was falling asleep. The kind of “asleep” he wouldn’t wake up from.

Still, the fact that Doyle was out there, on his side, filled him with a warm sensation. He wasn’t going to be alone in this.

He tucked his comm device in his back pocket and sidled into the breakfast room, amidst other bleary-eyed tourists with cheap pastries on their plates. He helped himself to the buffet and then found Francis in the corner. Zak slid into the seat opposite.

“About time,” Francis said, setting his glass of water down on an otherwise empty half of the table (come to think of it, he hadn’t actually eaten anything for dinner last night, either). “The naga went on ahead. We need to debrief. What do you remember about last night?”

“All of it, more or less,” Zak said, wolfing down his eggs as fast as he could. “It’s fuzzy, but it’s there. Not exact details, but I got the gist of it.”

No emotion registered on Francis’s face, his expression inscrutable under his goggles.

“Then you know I don’t appreciate you keeping such an important secret from me.”

“Yeah, and I don’t appreciate you trying to drug and kidnap me. So we’re even.” He downed half his orange juice in one go. “Are we going to just sit around while hating each other, or are we going to come up with an escape plan while hating each other?”

“Fine,” Francis said, tersely. “You’re the expert on cryptids here. You go first.”

“If I use my powers on them they’ll definitely figure out where I am,” Zak said. “It’s a risk I don’t want to take. Plus, they’re fast. The garuda nearly caught up with the Griffin; we can’t escape by land or air.”

“My ship doesn’t burrow,” Francis said, an edge of frustration in his voice.

“Maybe it doesn’t need to,” Zak said, pulling up a map on his communicator. He turned the screen around and pointed at a long trail of blue going north-south on the screen. “Sacramento River. It feeds out into the San Francisco Bay and from there the rest of the Pacific. If we can just get into it, we’re safe. If the garuda could dive into rivers, there wouldn’t be nagas right now.”

“It’s halfway across the city,” Francis said, brow furrowing. “But it is our best bet. If they haven’t managed to pinpoint our location, we might just be able to drive over to it.”

Right now, Francis’s ship was disguised as an innocuous, street legal, civilian light-gray van with tinted windows. Zak pulled his hood down low, until it covered his eyes and most of his field of view.

“You think I look enough like a tourist to make it across the parking lot?” He joked.

“No, you just look like an idiot. But it will do.”

“Yeesh. Tough crowd.” He pulled the fabric up a bit so he’d be able to see again, only to stop and blanch when a figure caught his attention out the corner of his eye. Furtively, he lowered his head and gestured with his left hand toward the lobby.

“Is that Paul Cheechoo?” He asked, hushed.

Francis didn’t turn to look; instead, he pulled out a sleek black phone and opened the camera. Turning it towards the foyer of the hotel, the stocky figure of the cold-weather geologist came into view.

“That’s him,” Francis confirmed. “We should go. Now.” He got up slowly, blocking Zak from view. “There’s a back entrance to the hotel that way. When you go through the door, crawl so you’re lower than the windows.”

He didn’t need any more prompting than that. He slipped down the hallway quietly, Francis on his heels, and ducked through the kitchens until they got to the alleyway entrance.

“Do you think they found me?” Zak asked, when the door closed.

“No. He was alone, and he’s useless in a fight. It’s more likely they’re just canvassing the area. Which - “

“Means they DON’T know exactly where I am,” Zak finished, a grin starting to form on his face. “That makes this easier, doesn’t it?”

“Maybe,” was all Francis cared to admit.

They peeked around the corner of the building towards the parking lot (or, rather, Francis peeked and Zak was told to stay put because they were searching for his face), and after making sure the coast was clear, he lead the way to the van.

“Don’t turn and look at him,” he hissed, when Zak tried to sneak a peek at the Scientist through the windows.

“I wasn’t.”

“Liar.”

“Jerk.”

“Idiot.”

“Asshole.”

They climbed into the van, and Francis turned the ignition, the engine purring to life and the decidedly un-van-like control panel flaring into lights. He pressed a few buttons on a touchscreen and a steering wheel unfolded out of a panel.

Zak watched Cheechoo out the rear-view mirror as they slowly backed out of the driveway. He was talking to the man at the check-out desk, leaning on the counter with his legs crossed, telling some funny joke or story or anecdote. The two of them were having a great time - there was a smile on the receptionist’s face.

And then he pointed at their van, which was pulling out of the lot.

Cheechoo whipped around to look at it, and Zak ducked down despite knowing the windows were too dark to see through.

“I can’t believe the guy at the counter would betray us like this!” he groaned.

“Well, there goes our advantage.”

“Damnit, why does Dr. Cheechoo have to be so good at making friends with everyone he meets?!”

Francis rolled his eyes and hit the gas. “In this traffic we can make it a mile, maybe two, before the other Scientists catch up. Considering the lemurians’ supposed charisma ability, it’s safe to assume that being caught by them is the same as being caught by the lemurians. I don’t want to be stuck in traffic with Deadbolt on my tail.”

“We should still be able to escape into the river,” Zak said. “None of them would have brought a submarine here.”

“We are escaping into the river?” Muca popped up out of the darkness and nearly gave Zak a heart attack.

“Yeah,” he said, no time to elaborate. “I think we might have to fly for it. If we stay low to the ground and in tight passages the garuda might not be able to do anything.”

“Hey,” Francis said, sharply. “Do the garuda have heat vision? A strong sense of smell? Anything that would make it so that turning the vehicle invisible would be useless against them?”

“No,” Muca said. “They hunt based on sight. We naga are the ones that employ all our senses.”

“The ship turns invisible?” Zak asked. “Cool!”

“Only for three minutes at a time,” he said, his right hand already tapping away at the touch screen. “It’s a massive drain on the battery, so there’s a ten-minute cooldown between each use. It’s not much, but it may be enough for a quick getaway. And, of course, it’s useless against sonar.”

“But Deadbolt isn’t fast enough to follow us once we’re airborne over the buildings,” Zak said. In the distance, he spotted a multistory parking structure. “There! Let’s get to the top for take-off.”

Francis was thinking the same thing, the ship already retracting its wheels and morphing back into the shape of a bullet with fins. And not a moment too soon - out the rear view displays, Miranda and Deadbolt came into sight, the Scientist riding on her robot’s shoulders, portal gun at the ready.

“Hang on,” Francis said, “I’ll try to lose her. If they don’t know what we’re aiming for, they can’t set up an ambush.”

He banked the ship hard, unfortunate Muca being thrown to the side of the vehicle, and they barreled down an alleyway. The steering wheel had changed shape into a joystick, and Francis had one hand on that, one hand tapping away at the touch screen.

“The collision avoidance on this thing is pretty sweet,” Zak admitted. “Why do jerks like you always get the cool rides?”

“I am colliding with all the loose objects in the back of the vehicle,” Muca added.

Sharur only rattled innocently against the wall it had been strapped to.

But no matter how they ducked and weaved between the buildings, they couldn’t shake Miranda and Deadbolt. At least the robot wasn’t shooting at them - in a civilian area like this, a stray bullet could be extremely dangerous - but Deadbolt was locked on tight, and in the winding alleyways, they were matched for speed.

A portal suddenly opened in front of them, and only Francis pointing the ship straight up and flooring the gas saved them from flying directly into it. Once they’d cleared the city skyline, however, the talons of a giant eagle were rushing at them, and Muca sustained a moderate amount of damage from the quick adjusting Francis had to do to get them out of the way of that.

Zak was definitely going to have a seat belt-shaped bruise in the morning.

“We can’t lose them,” Zak said. “We might just have to make a run for it.”

“Unfortunately, you’re right,” Francis agreed, perspiration from exertion running down his face. He maneuvered them until they went blasting back into the open road, all the streetlights stuttering for a moment as they passed, before banking hard and cutting in front of a honking truck into the winding annals of the parking complex.

The confined space made them hard to follow, the ship’s anti-collision efforts keeping them just clear of all the exit signs and stray vehicles, leaving behind a maze for Miranda and the robot. It looked like they were going to make it, miraculously, shooting out into the open air of the ceiling, only for Francis to skid them to a stop.

“Shit!” He cursed, but Zak grabbed his wrist.

“No,” he said, eyes twinkling. “I have an idea.”

 

* * *

 

Miranda and Deadbolt finally skidded up to the roof of the complex, where Beeman’s ship was waiting. The vehicle she’d been chasing was nowhere in sight.

“Arthur!” She barked out, and he glanced at her over his glasses and sudoku booklet, sitting in a lawn chair in the shade of his ship, which had been parked on the roof of the garage.

“We’re right next to each other, Blondie, you don’t have to shout.”

“Where’s the ship?”

He pointed upwards, at the rim of his own flying saucer. Miranda pinched the bridge of her nose.

“I meant the one that I was chasing. It just came up here!”

“No ship,” he said.

“That’s impossible.”

“‘Impossible’ is also what they said about compressing a mag-vortex wormhole generator into a rooty-tooty point-n-shooty, but you did it anyway,” he pointed out. “I heard some guys at MIT were working on hard-light holographic projection. Maybe you fell for something like that.”

“But how - _why_ \- would that be _here_?”

“I wouldn’t know. I’m the UFO guy, not the hard-light holographic projection guy.” He turned a page. “I know I’m a genius, but you can’t copy my homework forever.”

Miranda looked ill at ease, but ultimately convinced. Mostly, she just didn’t want to spend too much more time in the other scientist’s presence, at the pointy end of his barbs.

“Fine. Contact me the moment you see something,” she ordered. “Deadbolt and I will search from a higher vantage point.”

“Sure,” Beeman said, filling in a number with disinterest. “Say, you wouldn’t happen to know if there’s a world record for fastest sudoku booklet solved, or...and...she’s gone.”

Behind his ship, under its metal rim, an innocuous light-grey van flickered into view, and from inside emerged two teenage boys, keeping their heads low and sticking close to the shade of the UFO. Beeman didn’t turn around as Francis and Zak approached.

“So, Pandahead, Bangs.” Francis flinched at the nickname. “I believe you two officially owe me one.”

“Thanks, Uncle Bee,” Zak said, sarcastically

“Why are you helping us?” Francis decided to ask directly. Dr. Arthur Beeman had been the stubborn champion of the plan to freeze Zak cryogenically; the about-face was suspicious at best.

“Gift horse. Don’t look it in the mouth,” the Scientist said, avoiding the question. He tilted his head at Francis, his expression scrunching up like he was trying to remember where he’d seen him before.

“Does your dad know you’re out here?”

“No,” Francis said, a little too quickly. “And I’d prefer you not tell him.”

“Yeah, rah rah, stick it to the man,” Beeman said, rolling his eyes. “I can always call Rey and R2D2 back, you know.”

“Two months.”

Zak spoke up, and Francis nearly elbowed him for giving in to Beeman’s threat. The Scientist, for his part, didn’t seem particularly surprised either way, a bored expression hanging off his features since the two had first arrived here.

Zak continued.

“I need two months, and then it’ll be like nothing happened. We have a way to fix this, but if we can’t finish it by the deadline...if you guys can cryofreeze me or put me in magic tree sap, do it.” He curled his fists at his side, resolute. “But at least let us try.”

Francis looked like he wanted to comment on Zak’s negotiation skills, but Zak’s gut told him that directly was the only way to ask.

Beeman’s gaze shifted between the two kids, weighing his options. Turn the kids in? Don’t turn the kids in? Betray the other Scientists and the lemurians that were stringing them along like marionettes?

The growing silence made the kids squirm, Zak resisting the urge to bite his lip. Beeman was...uncharacteristic right now. The man in Zak’s memory was always smug and quick with the snarky remark, much moreso that now - but, then, it’d been about two years since his parents had let him speak to Zak face-to-face, and it was only recently and in emergencies that the parents were contacting Beeman at all.

It seemed they were all shouldering secrets. Zak had all but confirmed to the man that the threat the Scientists had been mobilized to contain was every bit as present as the lemurians would have him believe, and yet, rather than turn them in, he was actually seriously considering letting them go.

All the same, when he stood up, both Zak and Francis flinched backward, raising their arms and ready for a fight.

He crossed his arms and rolled his eyes. “Right now my ship is the fastest transport the Scientists have. Designated driver - that’s the only use I am to them.”

“That’s quite the demotion,” Francis commented, emotionlessly. Zak didn’t say anything - part of him felt like Beeman got exactly what he deserved.

“What it means is I’m already lucky they’re letting me come along at all. Whatever you two do, I want to be the one to spot you.”

“You’re trying to use us to up your reputation?” Zak asked, incredulous.

“Quid pro quo,” he said. Something for something. You scratch my back. ”It’s the least you can do for me not calling them on your asses now.”

“We’ll take it,” Francis said, pushing Zak’s protests aside. “We’re trying to dive into the Sacramento River. Once we get underwater, we’ll be out of reach. But if we make a break for it, the Scientists or the eagles can set up an ambush at the bank.”

“Sounds like you need a distraction,” Beeman said. “Can’t help you there. I’m trying to boost my rep, not drown it.”

Francis checked his phone. Five more minutes before the invisibility recharged.

A distraction would be their best bet, but none of them were expendable, and after Beeman had already covered for their “escape” on the roof, Francis could understand why he wasn’t at liberty to make any more moves to help them. A wolf cry could be enough to get him kicked out of his team, or worse.

But what could they use that could be left behind?

Beeman seemed to be thinking the same thing.

“Say, Jailhair. Kur’s back, right? Why don’t you just summon one of your creepy-crawlies, do some collateral damage Godzilla-style?”

“I don’t want to give the scientists _more_ reason to hunt me down,” Zak groaned. “...No, wait. Hard-light holograms...cryptids…”

His eyes lit up. “I think I have an idea.”

“Are you about to tell me that there’s a cryptid that uses hard-light holograms?” Francis asked. “Nearby?”

“‘If it’s weird, check the calendar,’” Beeman muttered. For whatever reason, that seemed to soothe Francis’s exasperation.

Zak raised an eyebrow, but continued. “A long time ago, we got a call about deer on the outskirts of town. Big deer like we were described don’t live in this part of the continent, but it’s not unheard of, so we almost just ignored it. But mom had a feeling there was something else going on.”

It’d been a beautiful spring day just like this one, in the shade of the northern mountains. Zak remembered the huge flock of deer the family had stumbled upon that bounded away into the forest and disappeared, leaving footprints in the mud that just...stopped. No bodies, no fur, no nothing.

“No matter what we tried to use, we couldn’t trap them. They slipped right out of everything like they were made out of thin air.”

“This sounds like a campfire story told by nine-year-olds,” Francis muttered to Beeman under his breath.

“Shut up. Point is: it’s a beetle that lets out a gas cloud that really messes with how light works. I don’t know if it’s ‘hard light,’ exactly, but its illusions are good enough to fool our radar.”

“Which is good enough for me,” Francis said, quick to recover from his initial incredulity. “Can you control enough to make a facsimile of our ship?”

“That’s the real question, huh,” Zak said. “I don’t know. But I can try.”

“Two minutes left on the invisibility recharge. Let’s get in the van and be ready to go as soon as you have the bugs in position.”

“Beetles,” Zak said. “Not bugs.”

“The _bugs_ ,” Francis repeated.

Bickering, they walked back to the ship, Beeman watching from the shadow of his.

“Wait,” he called out, as they both were about to climb in. The two of them looked over, not sure what to expect.

“Uh...listen. If Doc were here, he’d tell you two to ‘be smart.’” Encouragement was clearly not his forté, so he both looked and sounded uncomfortable as he delivered his pep talk. “It’s good advice, so I’m gonna say it: be smart. Or else the other labcoats WILL catch you. Got it?”

Zak ducked his head, hiding the conflicting emotions at his dad’s old catchphrase. It was easy to forget that Beeman and Doc had been friends - easy to remember all the times Beeman had gloated over their battered bodies. He’d hated Beeman as an enemy - heck, he’d hated Beeman as a babysitter - but...as an ally? The oddest mixture of distrust and relief.

“Got it,” Zak mumbled to himself, clicking the seat belt shut.

Francis wrapped his fingers around the joystick, pulling up a map on the touchscreen display.

“We’ll use one minute of invisibility to get as north as we can,” he said, tapping the screen at the approximate location they’d end up at. “After that, we’ll de-cloak. When the Scientists pick up our trail, I’ll need your bugs in position here.”

“Can do,” Zak said. “Then I lead them east while we book it west, right?”

“Right. The invisibility won’t last us all the way to the river, but we should be a surprise enough that they won’t be fast enough to stop us.”

“So all that’s left is the bugs,” Zak said.

“Beetles,” Francis corrected. He smiled over Zak’s glare.

“Give me the word when you’re ready to go,” He settled back in his seat, the engine purring beneath them.

Zak sucked in a deep breath, and let it out slowly, closing his eyes and reaching out for that familiar warmth, the glow of his fire.

An icy grip shot out of the darkness and grabbed him, breaking his concentration. The Serpent, with a bruising strength, regarded him with cold eyes, smoldering with dark amusement.

“Let me go,” Zak hissed. “You said you wouldn’t interfere.”

“ _Not interfering. Simply curious._ ” If it could sound gentle, it would. “ _You claim you despise this power, and yet it is your first resort._ ”

“We’ve got limited options,” he said, through gritted teeth. “This is just the best one.”

“ _Do not lie,_ ” the Serpent said, hardening. “ _There is nothing you know that I do not. There is nothing I know that you cannot._ _There is nothing you are that I am not._ ”

With eyes full of judgement, it tore through Zak’s flimsy excuses, down all the way to his core.

This had been the first call for him to use his powers since they’d returned to him, and he had been excited.

Even though he knew he shouldn’t be, even though he knew exactly what dark source the powers stemmed from. Still, his fire had pulled to him, had called for him, had licked at his veins.

He’d wanted this, even if he wouldn’t admit it.

“ _What are they called, those who refuse to recognize when they are lying to themselves?_ ”

His throat felt dry. “I’m not here for riddles.”

“ _Idiots_ ,” the Serpent said, letting go of him and retreating. “ _And neither of us are. Remember that._ ”

“...Jerk,” Zak breathed, in the wake of the Serpent’s absence.

He took a moment to compose himself, shaking off the chills.

The Snake was usually quiet, though Zak sometimes felt its gaze boring into his soul. He hated more, though, when it spoke to him. A nauseous sort of feeling always overtook him, one his parents had been careful to name when they’d first taught him the basics of science and bias. It was called “cognitive dissonance,” a mismatch between ego and truth. A feeling that humans would go to any lengths to quell.

Still, there was no use dwelling on it right now, so he didn’t. Shoving his feelings to the side and steeling himself, he reached out once more.

Like a siren, his fire sang to him, and Zak only hesitated a moment before falling into it, letting it settle across his shoulders and over his heart like a mantle, the hot mantle of the earth itself.

 

* * *

 

Zak opened his eyes, and they were alight.

Fascinating to watch, really. Zak’s entire posture had changed, though it was still undeniably Zak in that seat. His shoulders had lost some of the tension that seemed to haunt him of late, and his breathing had become even. Francis remembered the first time Zak had ever displayed this power in front of him, four years ago. It had been taxing on the boy back then, exertion written on all his features, and even back then, it had sent an odd prickling down Francis’s spine.

 _Dangerous_ , had been his immediate thought. And it _had_ been dangerous, but at the time his mind had meant it in a different sense. Dangerous as in magnanimous, as in complex. A gut feeling uninformed by logic, something he wasn’t supposed to have.

And then, following on that impulse, a second thought, even more out of place in his mind than the first: _incredible_.

That was unlike him. That was unlike everyone else in his People. And the feeling persisted into the next time he saw Zak’s power up close, in the Czech Republic, and it persisted even now.

Muca was staring slack-jawed and wide-eyed, so at least it wasn’t only him that found this power fascinating. Though, once she caught him looking, she sent him a glare, like she’d been doing all morning when Zak couldn’t see.

He’d have to talk to him about that.

“All systems go on my end, Franny. Let’s do this.”

“Next time you call me that, I’m kicking you out of the ship,” he said, sliding the engine out of its idle. Zak only grinned at him, and it took a fair amount of self-control to ignore the urge to punch him and get on with the countdown, instead.

“T minus three…”

The ship started to move, backing up to get a running start off the side of the complex, careful to stay shaded by Beeman’s ship.

“Two…”

Muca braced herself.

“...One.”

It flickered completely out of sight and lurched forward, morphing out of its civilian disguise as it shot down the complex, lifting off like an airplane, flying a straight shot up Main Street over the streetlights, the civilians, the clogged traffic, all of it. In his head, Francis was counting the seconds down of their allotted time, and once they hit ten, he ducked into an alleyway. In the cover of an awning, he let the invisibility fade, shooting back out into the streets, low to the ground and at a slower speed. On a street this wide, they were impossible not to see...and it was only moments before Miranda and Deadbolt were on their tails once more.

“We’ll lose them in an alleyway,” Francis said, mostly for Muca’s benefit. The ship made a sharp right-angle turn into the dark corridor behind a building, the scientist and her robot hot on their tails. Predictable. Dr. Miranda Grey was the kind to face a problem by throwing bigger guns at it, after all.

He liked when people matched up to their files; it made the world easy. Miranda Grey was traditionalist, Cheechoo shied away from fights and direct confrontation, Cheveyo was weak-willed and mild, and Mizuki could hold impressive grudges. If only the Saturdays could take a hint and stay on-script. Then his life would be easy.

“What did Beeman mean when he said ‘check the calendar’?” It was Zak who spoke up, one hand to his temple, one hand on the claw, his eyes ablaze.

“Really?” Francis asked, sweat on his brow with exertion, “You’re going to do this now?”

“What, you can’t drive and talk at the same time?”

He should not be _this_ good at goading him.

“Fine,” Francis said, spitting the word out like a curse as he twisted down the narrow passageways. “It’s a saying the other Scientists have. Are the insects ready to go? We’re almost there.”

“Ready,” Zak said. “You were saying?”

Francis sighed. “It goes, ‘if it’s weird - ‘“

They were fast approaching the rendezvous, but their path straightening out meant Miranda and Deadbolt were catching up. Francis pushed down on the gas just a little harder.

“‘ - check the calendar - ‘“

His finger hovered over the touchscreen, the button that activated their invisibility. Almost there...just right around the corner…

The moment he turned out of sight, he hit the button and rocketed the ship up into the sky. Below him, a solid replica of his vehicle continued down the alley, twisting and turning while Miranda and Deadbolt followed. Even his own display showed a dot moving east through the city, much larger and more substantial than a small swarm of insects.

“‘ - ...it might just be a Saturday.’”

They turned west and Francis hit the gas, barrelling towards the river as fast as it could. It lay gleaming in the sunshine, their safe haven, passage to the ocean, where they’d be home free.

“I can’t believe they say that about us,” Zak huffed. “I can’t believe Beeman says that about us. Who even came up with that?”

“Cheechoo,” Francis said. Zak just pouted in his seat.

“...Yeah, that sounds like something he would say,” he finally admitted.

Their invisibility died out about a minute away from the water, but, by that point, it was already too late for Miranda to catch up, though Francis did see her out of his rearview cameras as the ship hopped the guardrail surrounding the water’s edge and dove deep into the river below. It automatically switched to submarine mode, taking a couple seconds to get its bearings before blasting downstream, ferrying the three of them towards the Pacific Ocean.

Finally free, Zak released his hold over the ghost deer, and slumped back in his seat, grinning and flush with adrenaline and victory.

Muca spoke up from where she’d coiled herself around the wheel to the top hatch. “Are we done with the tilting and the trying to murder me in the vibrating vehicle?”

“Yeah,” Zak said, pleasantly.

“Wonderful!” She fell to the ground with a heavy thud and did not stand back up. Francis raised an eyebrow.

He set the ship to autopilot and reclined his seat back, pulling out his phone.

 

**GADFLY SATURDAY  
**

                                                           Zak, this is Francis.  
oh god. how did you get this number                                            
                                    I think you need to talk to the naga.  
                                  She’s been glaring at me all morning.  
                                I’m worried she’ll pull something if we  
                                                                   leave her alone.  
                                   What you’re trying to do isn’t exactly  
                                     something her religion approves of.  
ugh...you're probably right                                                         
do you have any suggestions, o                                                   
mission control?                                                                          
                                                I don’t know how nagas work.  
                                                 She seems to look up to you.  
                                                                    You can use that.  
                                             Convince her that our mission is  
                                               “the will of Kur,” or some other  
                                                                                nonsense.  
can you stop being shady for like                                                
2 seconds                                                                                   
i'm serious                                                                                  
                                          If you don’t like it, get a new Heir.  
yeah lol. after you, i;m sure anyone else                                     
would be a breath of fresh                                                          
“heir”                                                                                          
ba-dum-tshh                                                                             
                                                                                        No.  
is your blood “kur”dling?                                                            
                                                                                Stop this.  
i feel like were not gilga"mesh"ing on this.                                 
                                           I will turn this ship around and let  
                                                                 the garuda take you.  
it’s a coping mechanism, shut up.                                             
i’ll talk to her.                                                                           
                                         Good. And, while you’re at it, try to  
                                     weasel out some more information on  
                                 this place we’re going. The middle of the  
                                              Pacific Ocean is not very specific.  
i wouldn’t worry too much about that.                                       
even if muca doesn’t talk, i have an                                           
associate ;)                                                                                
                                            I really don’t like the sound of that.  
good :)                                                                                     

 

Before he could leave his chair, however, his phone buzzed with an incoming message.

“Who’s that?” Francis asked.

“Beeman,” Zak said, opening the letter. He leaned forward so Francis could see, too.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
hairtie  & robot are pissed. “i cant believe it was hard-light holographic projections!” ngl, hilarious.  
will pass along ur time limit 2 mohawk. msg back asap w/ deets.

“‘Mohawk’?” Francis asked.

“Probably Doyle,” Zak clarified.

“Ah, the mercenary.” Francis considered the message. “I can write him back if you go talk to the naga,” he offered.

“I don’t really trust you with my comm device, though.”

“Please,” Francis snorted, derisively. “The _last_ thing I want to do is root around in your private files to find your secret shames. I hate you enough without wanting to get to know you. Just go. I’ve got a better sense for this sort of thing, anyways.”

Zak glared at him distrustfully for a good few seconds before relenting. “Fine. But only talk to Beeman.”

“Mhm,” Francis said, noncommittally.

 **ZakAttack@scientiaest.ss**  
so basically, the lemurains WAY overestimated how much kur is back. we found a way to seal it away for good, but it takes 2 months. we need cover for those 2.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
wow. useful. try telling me sth u didnt already. like mb what last nights other email was abt.

Other email? Checking to make sure Zak wasn’t watching, Francis surreptitiously opened the “sent” tab on the email app.

…

Zak did not send this. Francis had the creeping suspicion he knew who did. If the Serpent had planned a “contingency”...

 **ZakAttack@scientiaest.ss**  
you should gather the things, but don’t mix them together. the person who sent u that from my device knows more than they let on, but i wouldn’t trust them entirely.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
who?

Francis started typing out a reply, when the comm pad pinged again with another message from the Scientist. Francis glowered - email wasn’t a PM-ing system, keep it all in one message! - but Beeman was going to Beeman, no matter what anyone did or said.

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
i dont like being treated like a flight risk.  
whats with this meandering? its like talking 2 a genie.  
1: what r u doing that needs 2 mo. 2: who sent the email last night 3: what do u need me 2 do that i can do.

 **ZakAttack@scientiaest.ss**  
sorry. it’s hard to know who i can and can’t trust right now.  
gilgamesh had a spear, and it can seal kur powers away without killing me. but to do that we need to activate it at 5 different places. there’s a few minor other issues, but only we can do it. if we can’t make it in 2 months, the stars go out of alignment or something, and my powers might...go a bit crazy.  
the person who sent you the email was the one who told us all this. some old guru from iran.  
any smoke you can throw in the direction of the scientists for just these 2 months would be helpful.

There - a message full of lies and half-truths, plausible enough not to be questioned, a few threads to pick at of little consequence.

If Beeman knew about the genocidal, sadistic other half camped out in the recesses of Zak’s subconscious, Francis doubted he’d remain on their side. Even Francis had contemplated forking Zak over to the lemurians, who seemed to have a viable neutralization plan, but ultimately decided there was little to be gained in that. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, that sort of situation.

His gut feeling - the one that shouldn’t exist - told him there was an untold trove of treasure in following the greatspear Sharur’s route, instead. And something about Zak WAS infectious, aside from the 30-40 exotic diseases he must be carrier of. He made Francis make poor decisions - uncharacteristic decisions.

 _Dangerous_ , his instincts warned. _Incredible._

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
ur not gonna tell me anything else huh.  
fair enough.  
thx for the update, goggles. tell black-n-white ill pass the memo along.

 **ZakAttack@scientiaest.ss**  
What gave me away?

 **bman@scientiaest.ss**  
sumer is in iraq.  
g2g, been in restroom so long other scientists r getting suspicious.

A frustrated sigh escaped Francis’s nose, his grip tightening.

_Sumer is in Iraq. Your lie was too flimsy. Idiot. Idiot!_

He could practically imagine the irritation and disappointment that would be on Epsilon’s face.

Dissatisfied, but task completed, he tossed the device onto the chair next to him. Zak and the naga were still arguing, and because neither of them was particularly good at regulating their volume, he could catch bits of their conversation even from where he was sitting.

“ - I lack the sense of taste required to enjoy ‘seasoning;’ raw is entirely fine with me! I can digest bones!”

Not for the first time, Francis raised an eyebrow.

“I mean, I know, but I just - rats have lots of diseases, especially from the city. I’m just worried for your health!” He shook his head. “No, look, nevermind. We’re getting off topic. The point is - you’re supposed to listen to me, right? So just - doing this, sealing away that...thing inside me, is the best for everyone I care about.”

“And that does not include the naga?” Muca asked. “The arabhar? The lou carcolh, the taniwha...those, you will not protect?”

“Kur is the ‘ultimate evil,’” Zak said, stating the obvious. “There aren’t any happy stories about it protecting _anything_.”

“Kur has always been a protector!” Muca said, almost as if she were angry about how wrong Zak was, before remembering who it was she was talking to. “...Does...Just Zak disagree?”

“Rani Nagi told me different,” he said. “She told me - everyone told me - that Kur wanted the total annihilation of all humans.”

“My…” her claws dug into her scales, disbelief coloring her voice. “ My queen said that?”

“‘Kur, the destroyer,’ she called me.”

Muca stared at him.

“That is...that is…” she sank down into her coils, looking as miserable as a snake person could. “...Something I may need time to consider.”

“...Are you going to try to stop us? From finishing Sharur’s gauntlet?”

“If it is your will...then let it be done,” she said, resigned. “I offer my services...as the naga were meant to do.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s...Zak. Just call me Zak. I’m really not...the dark snake messiah or whatever it is you’re hoping for. I’m just a dumb human kid.”

“Not ‘just’,” Muca said. “But yes...that is evident now. I need - I need time to consider.”

“Alright,” Zak said. “You do that.”

Muca mumbled something in her native tongue, something with colored with flecks of Hindi. Something about not being what the record said, something about wishing her teacher were alive. Zak came back to slump into his seat, and Francis pretended not to have been listening in.

 

 **GADFLY SATURDAY**  
hey.                                                                                            
                                                                                 Yes, Zak?  
what do you think? i know you heard                                          
most of that.                                                                             

 

Francis looked over at him, considering his options.

 

 **GADFLY SATURDAY**  
                                                        Tell me your thoughts, first.  
                                             I don’t want to color your opinions.  
i dunno.                                                                                   
like, you've met the guy.                                                           
i could see it try to kill all humans,                                           
not exactly friendly.                                                                  
i just can't see it being like…                                                   
not                                                                                          
the bad guy.                                                                            
you know?                                                                               
                                                          I hope you’re not looking for  
                                                 moral support. I’m on short supply.  
god.                                                                                        
you are actually the worst human                                            
being i know.                                                                           
                                             I choose to take that as a compliment.  
fine. don't say anything                                                          
just let me rant, alright?                                                        
this is...kinda the first time                                                    
i've ever been somewhere without                                          
family to...you know, talk to                                                  
and it's just...driving me kinda nuts                                       
like                                                                                        
look at this, i'm actually talking                                             
to YOU about my feelings                                                      
kinda scraping the bottom of the                                          
barrel.                                                                                   
                                                                               ✓ Read at 15:51 pm.  
yeah, that's much better, keep doing that.                           
i just - i never wanted this.                                                  
any of it.                                                                              
i used to think my powers were                                            
the coolest thing ever, but now -                                        
look! my parents are in monkey                                          
jail, and the people on my side are                                     
you and beeman and a freaking naga, like                          
                                                                     I know that there are stories  
                                                               about Kur and its general status  
                                                                  as the “ultimate evil,” but I was  
                                                           never so deep into the mythos that  
                                                          I knew any specifics. Why are we all  
                                                                       so hung up on that, again?  
you seriously never heard the                                             
stories? jesus, talk about late                                              
to the party…                                                                     
why do you even want to know?                                         
                                                                It just seems like a sort of broad  
                                                               generalization. Until now, there’s  
                                                            never been a reason to doubt it, but  
                                                               if the naga suddenly says that Kur  
                                                             is fundamentally a “protector,” then  
                                                               perhaps it would be best to review  
                                                                                 the defense. That’s all.  
fair enough...                                                                     
basically, since kur was slain                                             
by gilgamesh around 3500bce,                                         
all stories we have about it                                                
come from before then, so…                                            
it's a little hard to tell fact from                                        
embellishment.                                                               
you ever heard of jormungandr?                                      
                                                             Vaguely. Some myth about a snake  
                                                                                 that bites its own tail?  
or leviathan?                                                                   
or yamato no orochi                                                        
or gong gong?                                                                
probably not gong gong, that one’s                                
kinda obscure                                                                 
                                                                What point are you trying to get at.  
those are all giant, evil mythological                               
snakes, and they all probably                                          
trace back directly to kur.                                               
(source: my mom and dad wrote like 3 papers                 
on it)                                                                              
death, destruction, apocalypse                                       
that’s what kur’s associated with                                    
some of the stories can be directly                                 
pinpointed to villages or citystates that                         
used to exist...keyword “used to”                                   
according to the stories, they                                        
didn’t once kur was done with                                       
them.                                                                           
                                                                 ...Doesn’t that strike you as odd?  
what?                                                                           
                                                               If it really wanted to, Kur probably  
                                                                could have annihilated humans in  
                                                                      just a few weeks. It only takes  
                                                               a small army to steamroll a village,  
                                                            and, let’s face it, you had much more  
                                                                          than a “small” army at YOUR  
                                                                       prime, let alone Kur during its  
                                                                                                          heyday.  
                                                            Even now, I’m fairly certain you could  
                                                               topple the world in just a few weeks,  
                                                                         if you were strategic about it.  
                                                                 Total genocide of the species may  
                                                                     take longer just because of how  
                                                           many of us there are, but it’s certainly  
                                                                      within the range of possibilities.  
thanks.                                                                      
   i don’t actually know where you’re                               
trying to go with this. it’s not                                    
making me feel any better.                                       
                                                                              I don’t like inconsistencies.  
                                                            They mean that at least one person has  
                                                                                                the story wrong.  
                                                                 Do you want to talk more about your  
                                                                         feelings and how bad they are?  
not really. you’re kinda terrible at this.                    
                                                                                                                 Good.

 

And he would have left it at that, except Zak’s mood stayed foul the next hour and a half, kicking listlessly at the dashboard despite Francis’s protests. Was this a purposeful attempt to drive Francis insane, or was Zak actually just this naturally gifted at being the world’s most annoying person?

“Kur, the destroyer.” Of Francis’s patience, maybe.

“Fine,” he said. “I surrender. What do you want from me? A pat on the head and a kiss on the cheek? They didn’t exactly create me to be _comforting_ , Zak.”

“I don’t know,” Zak said, frustrated. “I just - it’s...a lot of pressure.”

Francis scowled in displeasure. “You think _you’re_ under a lot of pressure? With that family? _Those_ parents?”

“I’m not saying your life’s sunshine and roses, okay? If you wanna talk about it, I’ll listen! But if you’re not gonna - then don’t complain about me talking about mine!”

“That argument doesn’t even make logical sense. Why don’t you try getting your thoughts together before screaming at me?”

“Not everything can be _solved_ with logic!”

“This is the problem with you,” Francis said, “you’re irrational! You can’t process problems that are bigger than yourself and let yourself get bent entirely out of shape. There’s nothing you can do about your parents’ situation and you’re already doing everything you can about the Kur one, there’s no _point_ in wasting effort worrying about them. So _don’t._ ”

“And that’s _your_ problem, Francis. Do you think - do you think being an emotionless robot makes you better than me?”

“It does,” he affirmed. “ _Objectively._ ”

“ _‘Objectively,’_ you’re a jackass,” Zak huffed.

“Very mature, Zak.”

“Ugh,” he groaned. “Fine. You want mature? I’ll give you mature. ‘Look at me, I’m Francis, I’m the biggest hypocrite Zak knows! I think repressing my emotions makes my dick bigger and you bet I rub it in all over everyone I meet!’”

He shouldn’t stoop down to that level of taunt. He shouldn’t let Zak drag him down to Zak’s level. He knew this, and yet -

“‘Well, look at me, I’m Zak Saturday, and I function on the same base instincts as the animals my family wrangles and wouldn’t know subtlety if it bit me in the arse! I’m a coward that complains about change instead of adapting! Compared to me, even my brother, the _actual monkey_ , has a clearer head and more self-control!’”

“You leave Fisk _out of this!_ ” Zak growled.

“Or what? You need me to get rid of _your_ problem. If anyone is the liability here, it’s _you_.”

Zak was livid, eyes wide and working his throat like he wanted to scream, but it wasn’t coming out. His fists clenched and unclenched, his knuckles turned white, and then, finally -

“...Fine. You’re right.”

Of all the responses he expected, that was not one of them. Before Francis could stop himself and come up with something clever, a “what?” escaped his lips.

“You’re right,” Zak said, again. “I’m terrible at bottling up my feelings, and there’s nothing I can do, and you win, because my stomach’s still bruised from when Fisk tried to kill me, and my back’s still sore from falling out of the airship, and my jaw’s tired from trying to talk to _you._ I’m tired. I’m _done._ So that’s it. You’re right. You won.”

Francis gaped at him for a good few seconds before the neurons in his brain managed to spark back to life, a dumb “alright” falling out of his mouth in lieu of anything else.

Zak just snorted at him, disdain across his features, pulling himself out of the passenger-side chair and trudging to the back of the ship.

“You’re gonna make a great Epsilon when you grow up,” he spat, a hard-earned last word to end the conversation.

Francis could only sit stunned in his seat. the sound of his own heart was hammering in his ears, and his fingers were frozen on the armrests, digging indents in the faux leather.

Below him, the ship rumbled on, heedlessly ferrying them toward Pacific blue.

This was unlike him. He should - he should have something to say, some last biting word, some final edge in. That Zak had had the last laugh was...incomprehensible, but perhaps not so much as the fact that it had pierced through all of Francis’s bravado.

No matter how much he would not - _could not_ show it…

...It’d stung.

 

* * *

 

_Monsoon season. Lessons were cut short that day; no one wanted to miss the revelry on the surface world, the water rushing down the rivers fast enough to kill, the trees bowing before the might of the wind. It was like a festival, and the only ones left behind were the blind old historian and his favored student, reorganizing the tablets scattered all across the cavern floor._

_His eyes were milky, clouded like he was about to shed, but that was simply a marker of his venerated age. He stood with a stoop to his shoulders, which made him appear only marginally larger than Muca herself, and his scales - which had once been glossy brown in diamond patterns - had faded into a matte beige, and his claws were dull and worn from years of handling rock. Every tablet he picked up, the contents he had to check with his snout, rubbed shiny from years of reading by touch._

_“Mucalinda, dear,” he said, dropping her title as a sign of familiarity since the two of them were alone, “why don’t you go outside and enjoy the storm? It is not befitting for a young lady to be accompanying a creaky old male on such a day.”_

_“It is fine, Itihaskar. The others are better suited to testing their scales against the winds than I am. If I go out there, I may just blow away.”_

_“Don’t say that, dear. Itihaskar may be the most venerated position a male could hope to have, but you have many more options available to you. Why, you could be a noble. Or a general of the army. Or even the queen herself. The next one shall come from your clutch, after all.”_

_Muca could only shake her head. All the high titles available only to the females were decided equal parts by cunning and strength, and she had little of either. Her clutch-mates were quick to remind her of her deficiencies, especially of her lack of the latter, and her tail still stung from when some of the girls had pushed her down and picked off her scales like scabs, singing songs about the runt of the litter._

_Early-hatcher, tablet-scratcher, boyish-stature, plague-rat-catcher._

_No, someone like her could never even dream to be queen._

_“Would that I had been born a clutch earlier, instead,” Muca huffed. “Then I could have seen the splendor of Kur with my own two eyes.”_

_Itihaskar laughed. “Spoken like a true scribe.”_

_Beneath her claws, the etchings in the stone practically pulsed with meaning and significance. This one, she knew it well. The breaking of the ocean’s pride, one of Kur’s greatest conquests, one of the naga’s greatest memories._

_“Do you...do you think Kur will ever return?” Muca asked, hesitantly._

_Often, after the crueler teasings, she’d retire to the repository and lose herself in the world of the Great One’s tales. Judgement and power and queens of old; loyalty and duty and a sense of faith, of gravitas._

_She held those stories dear._

_“It has already been more than two centuries,” she continued. “We have already sacrificed so much, killed so many in its name...”_

_“Kur shall always return, dear one. Even the Great One is not exempt from the rules that govern all us touched by the magic of the Earth, as the queen is not free from the laws that guide our people.”_

_“Then...why has Kur not?”_

_Itihaskar took his time answering, carefully choosing his words, tapping on his chin with one of his dull claws._

_“Perhaps, my dear, that is a question you will ask it yourself, one day. I do not presume to know.”_

_It was a dissatisfying answer, but the only appropriate one, and Muca acknowledged that._

_“Still,” Itihaskar said, reassuringly. “When that time comes, it will be glorious. And, should you have succeeded me by then, then perhaps Kur may even come to you for guidance. Study hard to reach the point where your counsel is just as sharp as your queen’s fangs, won’t you?”_

_“Of course,” Muca said, bowing her head._

_There would be no higher honor than that._

 

* * *

 

“Zak?”

Muca gave the human’s body a couple shakes, rousing him from his slumber. The vehicle was small, but even so, the two humans had decided to sleep on opposite ends, Francis in the reclined driver’s seat and Zak in a sleeping bag in the back. From what Muca could glean of the terse dialogue they’d shared later that night, after Francis had left to do menial errands in the city and retrieve food, Zak apparently had some kind of “contact” that would guide them to the first huaca, the one in the middle of the sea. They were now travelling further into the ocean to meet them.

All that to say, she hadn’t been doing her job properly, if there was an outside source Zak was relying on for help, rather than her. Well, there was time now to remedy the wound.

He seemed to startle when he saw her in the dark, jolting up before something in his mind connected and he instead just slumped forward, disappointed.

“You know, your eyes glow red in the dark, Muca,” he muttered. “What’s up?”

She tapped on her scales nervously, until she realized what she was doing and forced herself to stop.

“I...wished to speak with you. Is that alright?”

He ran a hand through his hair and let out a long breath. “Sure.”

And there was much she wanted to say - all the history she’d crammed into her skull, all the studying she’d done of the enemies to her kind - but she forced herself to swallow them all. No, this Kur would not care about those. This Kur wanted something different than the one that came before.

“There used to be many naga,” she began, settling across from him. “A small army of a few hundred. Every hundred years a new clutch would be laid, and a queen would be chosen every fourth clutch. This is because of our lifespan: we live for about seven hundred years, and reach an age of maturity after one hundred and fifty. I believe...you can see a disparity.”

Even groggy, Zak could follow, the math adding up in his head. “Your queen is older than seven hundred.”

“Yes,” Muca said. “This is because we entered into a hibernation, two hundred and fifty years after Kur perished. We had only intended to sleep until Kur’s return, but when we had been awoken, four thousand years had passed. This was fifteen years ago.”

When you were born, Zak. He seemed to be absorbing the knowledge with passivity, a guarded distrust in his eyes. How much had the naga failed him, that he had come to scorn his once most loyal retainers?

“When we had finally awoken...only us few, the few you have seen, have known, remained. The rest…” she paused to compose the waver in her voice. “The rest, whether by natural disaster or by the hands of our enemies, perished years and years ago.”

Zak narrowed his eyes. “Sorry, Muca, but it’s already a bit too late to make me feel bad for you guys.”

“I understand!” She said, quickly. “And that is not my intention. I simply - wanted to let you have the truth. Whatever you intend to do with it.”

He gauged her honesty, her earnestness. Eventually, he seemed to relent.

“Why did only you guys survive?”

“My queen and her harem were sequestered in the deepest, most impenetrable chamber in our caverns. And I...was lucky.”

The truth was shameful. The truth was, frankly, embarrassing. But Zak would appreciate the truth, wouldn’t he?

“My clutch-mates refused to let me sleep with them. My teacher - mentor - the old historian whose title I now hold - was with them, as he was their teacher, too. And I had nowhere else to go, so I...there was a small cave. A hole, really. I’d run there to escape tormentors sometimes. It was just barely large enough for one. It was purely by chance that I was the only one not in my queen’s chambers left unharmed.” She shook her head. “No, it was a mistake. Would that any other had survived in my place.”

“Oh,” Zak said, blankly.

“I think you would have liked my teacher,” she said. “He was odd. Funny.”

“What happened to him?”

The memory hurt. In the end, there had been nothing left but shattered, calcified bones, picked clean by the ocean.

“A device called an ‘oil platform’ punctured their cavern. Crushed their bodies. All those deaths, and yet the structure was long-abandoned by the time we awoke.” She smiled. “There is not even anyone left to hate.”

No secrets, no lies.

Kur had been a point the naga had wagered everything on. They had awoken to a world where human structures rivalled the height of mountains, where cities gleamed with tamed light under thick clouds of poison, where the numbers of their enemies had swelled to rival the stars in the sky.

And Kur counted himself among their number. Wished to return to their fold. Yes, the naga had bet on Kur. They had bet on Kur, and they had lost.

“Honor,” among the naga, was a foolish notion. Life was hard-earned and precious; so long as one had wits and cunning, claw and fang, then they must live with everything they had. Honor was only meant for when destruction was guaranteed, when no salvation would come. Face life with treachery, with caution, with fury. Face death - only death - with honor.

Yes, this may be the end of her kind. If it was, then let her meet it with dignity.

“It is frustrating to know that Kur has returned, and wants nothing to do with that destiny. It is maddening. But it is also your choice to make, Zak.”

“You know there is a Kur inside me that will be everything you guys wanted,” he said, voice low. “I know you know. If you sabotage us, then that Kur wins. It takes over, the humans die. Why are you on my side?”

“It is not a matter of sides,” she answered. It was simple. “Kur is Kur.”

His eyes narrowed, a hot, sick anger rising in his throat. “I’m not Kur. I’m not Kur anymore. What else do I have to do to prove it? When we finally finish this stupid quest will it finally be enough to prove to everyone that I’m not - “

“You are,” Muca said, gently. “You always will be, powers or no. Just as you always will have been born a human, too. One does not destroy the other. Both are the ‘truth’.”

Both are the “truth,” huh…

He buried his head in his arms and gave a long sigh, letting all the frustration of the day fall out of him like his mother had taught.

Deep inside him, the Serpent stirred.

No, he was not _that._ That thing inside him craved fury and destruction, domination and control. The slaughter of weak, helpless innocents. No matter how Zak looked at it, it was every inch as evil as he’d been lead to believe.

...Right?

 _Maybe,_ the Serpent whispered, dark amusement tinging its voice. Zak shuddered and pulled away.

He would never be _that._ His resolve was made of stronger stuff.

“Hey,” he finally said, lifting his head out of his arms. “Try to get along with Francis, alright? I mean, I know he’s a jackass. And I guess the naga have a pretty good reason to hate humans. But, I mean, he’s...had it rough. I dunno, just - “

“Yes, I suppose I have been unfair,” Muca admitted. “We know, too, how it is to be targeted for the scales on our backs. I will accept this human ‘contact’ of yours, as well.”

“Oh,” Zak said, awkwardly, “right. Uh. About that…”

“Zak,” Francis called, tersely, from the front of the ship. How long had he been awake? What had he heard? “You didn’t tell me that your ‘contact’ was about the size of Constantinople.”

“I mean, he’s not,” Zak said. “The citystate he’s king of is.”

“Oh.” Muca said in a flat voice. “Oh no. Zak…”

“‘Oh no’? ‘Oh no’ _what?_ ”

“Okay,” Zak said, “In my defense, I wasn’t friends with Muca until like three minutes ago.”

There was a tapping on the glass windshield, which immediately had Francis in a panic to turn on the lights. Who could possibly - ?

The figure the lights illuminated was neither man nor fish, but, rather, something in between - tall, lanky, in loose clothes that billowed out around his frame in the inky water, with a necklace made of kelp hanging loosely around his neck.

He put one hand on his hip and raised the other in a wave, a cheeky smile on his fish-man face. Weakly, Zak waved back, even as Francis sat stone-still in shock and Muca recoiled back in terror.

“His name is Ulraj,” Zak introduced him. “He’s the king of Kumari Kandam.”

“I hate Saturdays,” Francis groaned under his breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> formatting those text messages was a royal pain


	14. cupiens vitare charybdim...

“Zak,” Ulraj said, his jaw clenched tight and his arms crossed, the fin on his head puffed up to its full height, “I hope you realize that that is a naga.”

Kumari got big - an adult stood a head taller than even Doc - and Ulraj was beginning to shoot up into his eventual full height. He stood a full head taller than either human, bearing himself with an odd, alien regality, using every inch to impose himself.

“I was unaware Zak was friends with...fish,” Muca said, with an obviously false bravado. “The king of fish, even.”

She had shrunk back against the side of the van. What was the saying - even a cornered rat will bite the cat? Zak had never seen her so venomous before. Unfortunately, she wasn’t intimidating in the least.

Ulraj’s eyebrow ridges shot up at the dig, regardless, turning to Zak with a look of incredulity on his face.

“You see it, right? The naga. I am not hallucinating. For some reason there is a naga - bane of the ancient world, agents of the living apocalypse, _et cetera et cetera_ , in the ship with us.”

“Zak,” Muca said, quietly, “may you forgive me for being presumptuous, but he is tracking seawater into the vessel.”

“Yes, yes, and forgive me for being presumptuous, but did we all forget the whole thing about the naga being - “ Ulraj scowled. “ - what’s the word...our sworn enemies?”

In the midst of all this, Francis was silent, miserable, his eyes fixed on the slowly expanding puddle beneath the kumari’s feet. “He _is_ tracking seawater into the ship.”

Ulraj narrowed his eyes at him. “Well, you are tracking a ship into my seawater.”

“It’s going to rust,” Francis mumbled, ignoring him.

“So,” Zak said, faking positivity as he stepped between them. “Ulraj, this is Francis. Francis, Ulraj.”

Neither of them said a word.

“...Right. And, uh, Ulraj, this is Muca. Muca, this is Ulraj.”

“Yes,” Muca said.

“Don’t call it by a _name_ ,” Ulraj growled. “You’ll get attached.”

They stood in an awkward circle for a good three minutes, Ulraj and Muca glaring each other down over Zak’s shoulders, Francis wishing he was anywhere but here, until finally the agent-in-training threw up his hands in defeat and slumped back into the pilot’s chair.

“I can genuinely say that hate all of you,” he said. “I don’t care. I just don’t care anymore. Fish-man, snake-girl, evil god, whatever. If you want to tear each others’ throats out - good! But while we are in my ATV, either you do it outside, or else you kill me too. Let me know when you’ve decided; I’ll be waiting, sat right here.”

All three of them shared glances. None of them were particularly comfortable with the silence, but neither were any of them willing to make the first move to break it. Finally, Ulraj, with all the dignity he could muster, ventured forth.

“So, uh, Zak,” he said, letting his glare drop. “You...said you wanted my help guiding you somewhere. And, knowing that I cannot resist the call of adventure, you lured me in despite knowing one of our ancient enemies would be coming along. May I ask how it’s tricked you into leaving it alive?”

“She’s helping us,” Zak said, quickly. He hadn’t actually realized how deep the bad blood ran. Still, he needed both of them on this journey, and he only needed them to hold together long enough to get to their first destination. “She’s our ancient language translator.”

“You know I can do that, too,” Ulraj huffed, hurt. “You do not require that thing around.”

Zak raised an eyebrow. “Can you read Sumerian?”

There was a long pause.

“...No,” Ulraj admitted.

“Then she’s our translator,” Zak said. Muca nodded in relief.

Ulraj rolled his eyes and re-crossed his arms. “Alright,” he said, grudgingly, “but you can’t trust a naga, remember that. They don’t stop at anything to get what they want. And I’m not turning my back on it, lest I wind up with fangs in my back.”

“Sheesh,” Zak muttered. But still, he knew better than to press it. From what he understood, nagas had massacred his kind - massacred Zak’s kind, and would do it again.

It was easy to forget when he looked at Muca, but nagas were, as a species, bad news. In human art and architecture, the best light they ever got cast in was in the role of agitators - evil deities to be overcome on the path to enlightenment. Daughters of Mara. As desperate as he was to have anyone on his side - anyone in his corner, he had to remember that the nagas weren’t. Not really.

He glanced at Muca, who was holding her tail and pressed against the wall. So he couldn’t trust her species - sure. The rest of them didn’t care about _him_ , they only cared what he could do for _them_. But what about her? Was she on his side? Or was she - like everyone else in her damn snakehole - a liar?

Ulraj only snorted and tossed his head, still thoroughly displeased with her presence. “I suppose it’s a good thing for her she looks so weak. If she were full-grown she might actually pose a threat.”

“Yeah,” Zak agreed, halfheartedly. “Listen, let’s just - get to business.”

Ulraj glowered, but acquiesced with the barest shrug of his shoulders. “Fine. There was a Kur problem, you said? You asked the right king for help, Zak.” He looked around. “Where’s Fisk? I know you told me your parents were taken, but - “

“Him, too,” Zak said, voice dropping a little. “And Komodo. Doyle and Zon got away, but...well, we can’t really meet up right now.”

“Oh,” Ulraj said, expression softening. He sighed, and loosened his stance, arms falling to his side.

Clearing his throat, and widening his feet, jutting his chest out, he forced himself into his usual charming bravado.

“So this is a secret mission, then,” he spoke with the booming voice usually reserved for announcing a toast. “Excellent!”

He clapped Zak on the shoulder, beaming. “There’s always something exciting going on around Zak Saturday. You’ll have to give me a full account on our way.”

Zak’s mouth twitched up just a little at the attempt to cheer him up. “Yeah, totally.”

Ulraj was still keeping a clear distance between himself and Muca, but for Zak’s sake, was pretending to be alright with her. It’d been only a few days since this crazy adventure started, but it felt like it’d been years, and between Francis’s mutual hatred and Muca’s over-the-top respect, he’d almost forgotten what having a real friend felt like.

It was nice.

“Yes,” Ulraj continued. “I think I understand the situation. A heroic quest, like epics of old, and the very first step lies in the middle of the ocean.” Putting on a haughty air, he turned to the driver’s seat and pointed. “Bring me the map!”

A completely unmotivated Francis reached one arm out toward the touchscreen and pulled up the photo he’d taken of Sharur’s scorch marks. Just as listlessly, he zoomed in on the point in the middle of the Pacific, while Ulraj drew close, carefully watching Muca from the corner of his eye.

But soon his entire focus was on the map in front of him. His countenance grew grim and heavy, one hand stroking his gills, quiet for a long time until even Francis turned to see what was concerning him.

“Hmmm,” he mused, dramatically, after a long pause. “Yes, it is very good that you two humans have asked for my help with this. Truly, there is no destination more fitting for your companion to be the king of Kumari Kandam.”

Francis furrowed his brow. “Is it dangerous? Or something the ATV can’t handle?”

“No,” Ulraj said, serious expression turning into an excited grin. “It’s just this is someplace I’ve always really, really wanted to go.”

 

* * *

 

The kumari once had a sister species, or maybe more like a sister breed, and that sister’s relative fame helped the kumari slip into the deep, dark waters of obscurity. No one was looking for the lost city of Kumari Kandam when the lost city of Atlantis was of so much more renown. All the better when their name faded into the world of myths and legends, when reports of kumari food-harvester breaching trips were met with human ridicule; “you’ll be telling me you found Atlantis next.”

It was too bad the Atlanteans were all long-gone. Legend had it that a demon, monster, had come to punish them for breaking the Old Laws, and now all that was left of them were ruins and tales, passed down by kumari fry-mothers to scare fingerlings into behaving.

Though there was really only one ruin: the proud Atlantean capital, built on the ridge of the Marianas Trench, buried leagues underwater at the bottom of the sea.

Challenger Deep.

“We have an old agreement with the Atlanteans, from thousands of years ago,” Ulraj explained, as the ship descended through the water. “We split the ocean horizontally. The serpent-riders, kumari, took to the top of the ocean, every place the sun could reach. The Atlanteans took below.”

“Why are they called Atlanteans if their capitol is in the Pacific?” Zak asked.

“They were never very good at human geography,” Ulraj shrugged.

Challenger Deep was far below where the city-serpents deigned to swim, and the kumari cities were not built to withstand the water pressure besides. For those two reasons, save a few expedition teams several hundred years ago, no kumari had since ventured into the ruins - at least, none who were ever heard from again.

“Scouting parties - the initial ones, the ones that survived - said they believed that Atlanteans were their own undoing. That their population grew too large for the city to handle, and their infrastructure was too corrupt for them to build new living spaces fast enough. Eventually, the whole thing collapsed under its own weight.”

 _Ominous_ , the passengers thought. Sharur rattled against the side of the van.

As their ship descended, the largest city-serpent passed them by, rocking the little gray vehicle in the jetstream of its wake. Muca and Francis both stared at it with distrust, while Ulraj and Zak waved at the city built on its back. Far in the distance, little more than blurs, swam the other two snakes, metropolises fastened to their hides.

They were headed into uncharted territory, something deep, dark, and secret. How did that old saying go? That they knew less about the bottom of the ocean than they did the surface of the moon?

Francis wasn’t used to big like this. He was used to human-sized problems, in human-sized places. There was a statistic: even if all the humans on the planet were rounded up and stood shoulder-to-shoulder - every of the several billions of them - they’d only take up a space as large as the city of Los Angeles.

How big, then, was the ocean?

Colossal. Endless.

He hated the sea. At least they could terraform the surface of the moon, someday.

Eventually, their descent took them from dim moonlight to absolute pitch-black, which even the highest settings on the headlights did nothing to alleviate. Zak watched the bars on his commpad tick down from five, to three, to one, to a little spinning circle futilely searching for a connection to the world above. The vehicle’s seams creaked from the thousands and thousands of tons of water that bore down on them. One opened seam in the metal and it would all be over.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Francis asked, scowling at the blackness of the ocean. Not being able to see was borderline maddening, especially since they’d turned off the headlights to save on energy.

“Oh, yes, quite sure,” Ulraj answered. “We kumari are never lost at sea, you know.”

He touched the control console. “May I?”

Francis shot him a glare. “Are you _dry?”_

“Yes,” Ulraj lied. After a long second of angry silence, Francis stood up and let Ulraj sit down in the driver’s seat.

Zak was dozing off in the passenger-side, and Muca appeared to be sleeping in the back corner of the van, buried in her own coils. However, she stirred when Francis drew close, sliding down to the ground against the back door, head back against the cool metal, listening to the engine purr.

He was hoping she’d stay quiet, but lately, nothing was going his way.

“Good day,” she said, sleepily. “Well, it looks like night. But it is morning. So good day.”

He decided to ignore her. Maybe she’d shut up on her own.

“Zak has many kinds of friends, does he not? A fish-man. Peculiar. To think he’s decided to ally himself with them, of all things.”

“I’m not really in the mood for polite conversation,” he said, crisply.

“I assure you it is not polite,” she said. “I am being quite rude, in fact. I am insulting his species.”

Francis sniffed. “Why? You two look about the same to me.”

“Ah,” Muca said, eyes sparkling, “so you are doing it, too! Rude. Say more unpleasant things about us. This is the fabled…’gossiping with friends’!”

He stared blankly at her.

“The kumari helped wipe out most of your kind, right?”

“Mhm.”

“But you guys slaughtered countless numbers of them?”

“Mhm.”

“So you’re both genocidal monsters.”

“Oh, yes. Though your kind isn’t much better.”

Francis snorted - she had him there. “No. I suppose not.”

“Say, heir to humanity, tell me.” Her tail was twitching, scales rasping against the metal floor. “Doesn’t...this all...seem odd to you?”

“I’m conversing with a half-animal, half-teenage abomination while another one pilots the ship towards the lost city of Atlantis,” Francis deadpanned. “So yes - it is a little odd.”

“Yes, yes, there is that, but - but! I mean to say, that is to say...doesn’t everything seem...convenient?”

Francis narrowed his eyes.

“What do you mean?”

“...I am not sure,” she admitted. “I’m unsure if I can voice it. But ever since Kur’s tomb, I have had a suspicious feeling crawling beneath my scales. It makes no sense. The way things have been arranged.”

She leaned in like a conspirator, confiding her worries in a hushed whisper.

“It makes one wonder what happened five thousand years ago. Doesn’t it?”

“I know what happened,” Francis said.

Muca stared quizzically at him. “You do?”

“Yes. Your side lost.” He heard an amused snort from the driver’s seat.

“Oh,” she said, taking it in stride. “But how?”

“How would I know?”

“Heir to humanity, would you not understand humanity better than I?”

“‘Heir to humanity’ - listen, I’ll tell you what I know about _humans_.” He was getting really tired of that title, that for whatever reason she insisted on using. “Humans are _stupid_. They’re irrational, they’re illogical, and they’ll eat each other alive for no good reason at all, but at least they’re not friendless, tactless, gormless armored worms like _you_.”

He was hoping maybe the jab might get a rise out of her, but she seemed barely affected. In fact, she had on a funny look, and the difficulty he had reading her expression was frustrating. Humans, humans were easy, he’d spent hours and hours memorizing microexpressions and body language across every culture from every major player in the world. But the fishman and the snake girl? They moved wrong. In Muca’s case, she moved too slow, her features carved out in harsh ridges and rigid scales. Francis got the feeling that she was unbelievably expressive by naga standards - that all her weird fidgeting with scales, twitching of her tail, they all meant something - but it was too foreign, alien, and he felt uneasy around her. He couldn’t read her like he could read Zak; he couldn’t tell what she was thinking. For what machinations the gears turned.

“Say this, heir to humanity,” she tilted her head, “do you think humans are inadequate to inherit the earth?”

He snorted. So it was some speciesist soapbox spiel she was going for, huh?

“Most of them can barely do what’s good for themselves, let alone something like the _earth_.”

But that didn’t seem to be enough for her, since she asked again. “Do you think they are worth saving?”

“By and large? Let me put it this way: they still debate on saving the planet like it’s a political issue. They’ll just get what’s coming to them, one way or another.”

...Ah, he could almost recognize that expression, even he couldn’t understand why.

Concern.

“You don’t have much love for your own kind, heir to humanity,” she said.

“And why should I?”

“A fair argument,” she acknowledged. “Even still, you are human. If you hate even something so fundamental to yourself, then how do you live with the rest of it?”

He wanted to be done with this conversation. His lips pursed into a thin line.

“So naga,” he said, “how does it feel to know all your friends are dead?”

“Oh, it’s alright.” She did seem genuinely unaffected. “I never had friends in the first place.”

“Your teacher,” Francis pointed out, now on the offensive, “he’s dead.”

“Hm, yes. He is.” She crossed her arms. “You are quite good at this impolite conversation thing. Are you self-taught?”

Francis sighed into his hands. First Zak, now Muca, getting in the last laugh on him. He was losing his touch.

“Allow me to put it as plainly as I can,” he said, quietly simmering. “I don’t _like_ you. We are not _friends_. And this ‘heir’ business is one big steaming pile of pixie farts, and I’ll be glad to be rid of it.”

“Why?” Muca asked, innocently. “What else waits for you?”

“Go away,” Francis said. “Leave me be.”

Nervously, she tried to oblige, scooting toward the front of the ship, only for Ulraj’s glare to send her back. Sighing with frustration out her nose, she buried herself in her coils, leaving only the steady, rhythmic tapping of her claws against her scales to annoy Francis until he, too, dozed off, head resting against the warmed, aged wood of Sharur, strapped next to him on the wall.

 

* * *

 

“Hey, shithead, we’re here.”

Francis caught Zak’s wrist with a bruising force before it reached his shoulder to shake him awake, and he glared up at the other boy with a scowl.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Sheesh,” Zak said, as his arm was released. “I didn’t want to anyway.”

He felt groggy as he got up, his senses unacceptably dull and his limbs heavy and slow. That wasn’t a good sign - he hadn’t been planning to sleep longer than an hour.

“How long have I - “

“We gave you a few extra hours,” Zak shrugged. “Ulraj’s idea.”

“Well, tell him next time not to bother. I’m trained to run on low sleep.”

“You can tell him yourself,” Zak bit back, before pointing at Sharur. “Bring it with you. Ulraj and I’ve been scoping the place out.”

And with that, he leapt out the side of the van, and scrambled off down the road. Francis’s eyes, still blinking themselves awake, winced in the bright sunlight pouring in from the front windshield of the van.

...Sunlight? They were at the bottom of the ocean, weren’t they?

Nervously, his hands fumbled for Sharur, and he slung it across his back. He stepped down out the front door and into the light, shielding his eyes as they adjusted. He had to work very hard to bite back the noise of pure awe that almost bubbled out of his throat.

Above his head stretched endless black. As he squinted to get a better look, he realized that the black was not of the night sky, but of the abyssal ocean water, being held at bay only by what appeared to be an enormous glass triangle. It met three others in a point far above his head. Beneath the pyramid was a metropolis.

The city that lay before him was obviously a true sight to behold back in its heyday, but was now a glorious, beautiful, ruined mess. Its lights, which pulsed in an almost biological way, had given it the impression of being lived-in at first glance, but as he drew closer and noted the crumbling walls, the empty windows, and the streets filled with debris, the illusion quickly vanished. Two giant pillars, decorated with imagery of fish and ocean vents, topped with the likeness of a spiked seahorse, clearly boundary markers for the city limits, were the only monuments that remained proud and beautiful. Everything behind them was run-down, in disrepair - but it still gleamed in the artificial light, everything a child’s wild fantasies of the sunken paradise were made of.

However, Francis had never had the luxury of childlike wonder. He was standing in the lost city of Atlantis, nestled inside a crystal pyramid at the bottom of the ocean, but there was no magic to be had in his eyes, only the tattered remains of urban decay.

Sighing, he shifted Sharur so that it sat more comfortably on his shoulders, and picked his way across the crumbling mother-of-pearl road until he caught up with the rest of the group, who were all ooh-ing and aah-ing over the broken remains of the city.

“Truly incredible, the architecture,” the fishman was saying. “Our sister species was always renown for their civil engineering, but - you see this inlay? This beautiful coralwork?”

“I don’t think it’s coral,” Zak said, inspecting a chunk of wall. “It kind of looks...crystalline. How old did you say these ruins were? They’re so well-preserved, there practically isn’t even any dust on it - “

“Dust?” Ulraj asked, clearly somewhat unfamiliar with the term.

“Dead human skin cells,” Francis deadpanned, pushing past Muca.

“Oh,” Ulraj said. “That’s gross.”

Zak was pretending not to notice Francis’s intrusion - good. They walked in silence as they journeyed deeper into the city, as the decay became more and more evident. Large tracts of the city were almost immaculate, a postcard-perfect snapshot of life if only there were people - fishy or otherwise - walking around. As it was, however, inns and restaurants stood empty and hollow; homeless shelters and grungy stalls sat abandoned and dry, and the overcrowded streets were silent save the sound of three footfalls and one set of scales slithering over deep-sea rock.

He did have to hand it to the Atlanteans, he supposed. Their buildings curled in conch-shell spirals high above their heads, scraping the sides of the pyramid, and the streets, while cluttered and littered with trash and debris, were straight. He had been expecting, perhaps, a quaint sort of city, like in artist’s renditions of ancient Greece or Rome, but the impression he was left with was instead of seedy New York, or the worst parts of inner Detroit - skyscrapers, abandoned shopfronts, barred windows, and a looming claustrophobia. The uneasy feeling was only compounded by the steep uphill slant of the roads, as they journeyed deeper into the once-proud Challenger Deep.

That it was an abandoned ghost town was eerie enough, but something more was gnawing at Francis’s instincts. Something far more sinister.

The metropolis was abandoned, despite showing every sign of overpopulation, but…

Where did everybody go?

He clenched his fist and walked on.

A few minutes later and they arrived at the heart of the city. The height of the pyramid had made it seem much larger than it was; all in all, the actual livable space could only have been a few dozen square miles. He remembered the proud seahorse pillars that had marked the entrance to the city, where their walk had begun.

What a far cry it was from the scene before them.

Buildings had been toppled, statues torn down, lying broken on the pavement. The city here looked eviscerated, practically torched, and weapons lay scattered, broken and discarded. Angry foreign scrawl had been chiseled into stone walls, had been signed with stains that looked like either burns or blood.

“What happened here?” Zak asked, voice hushed.

Francis could only answer the truth.

“A riot.”

“A civil war, more like,” Ulraj said, fingers brushing the scrawled graffiti. “It’s crude, but it’s quite telling. ‘If you will leave us hungry - ‘“

“‘ - then we will eat you,’” Muca finished.

Ulraj glared at her, but acknowledged her translation. “More or less.”

Fascinating, but he wasn’t exactly here for a history tour. Brushing his way past Zak and up to their guide, he nudged aside a broken spear. “So we’re here in the city,” Francis said. “Let’s hurry up and get to the huaca so we can be on our way.”

“Right, yes,” Ulraj said, pulling himself away from the graffiti. “Well, that might be a little more difficult. The city’s layout is similar to how we build ours, but…”

He started to walk a slow circle around the square, his ears twitching as he considered the collapsed buildings and the narrow, claustrophobic streets leading out. He stopped at the largest building, which looked like it must have been beautiful at one point, broken bits of gold and mother-of-pearl still inlaid along its smooth, spiral surface, but now looked like an empty husk, burnt from the inside-out.

“Normally, this would be where the temples are. The heart of kumari cities. But this?” He rapped on the wall. “It’s a bank.” He pointed down at all the other impressive buildings, similarly in states of ruin, battered by civil unrest. “Courthouse. Taxation office. Atlantean Wal-Mart.”

“Sounds like a well-organized town,” Francis said, impatient.

“No no,” Ulraj said, his brow furrowing. “Let me rephrase: this is where the temples should be. Which is where your power source would be. But we are at the highest point of the city, and there is nothing here.”

Nervously, they all looked around. True enough that there didn’t seem to be anywhere that looked half as significant as here - if Ulraj hadn’t read the signs, then Francis would have assumed, himself, that he was in some kind of temple courtyard - but why would a mystical hotspot ever be inside a bank? It seemed absurd.

Zak was the one who broke the silence, squinting his eyes at the downhill slope of the roads. “Ulraj, kumari cities are built going up, right? So your castles are in the middle of town and your temples are on the floors above.”

“Yes, that’s right,” he said.

“Well, your cities are also on the backs of sea serpents. There’s nowhere to go but up.”

Which meant...that what they were looking for was below. All three of them turned to stare at the ground, as if looking hard enough would let them see through the carefully laid bricks.

“Are you suggesting they buried their temple?” Ulraj said, a slight note of outrage coloring his tone. “That would be - “

“How would we get down there?” Francis asked, interrupting. “The streets are solid. I haven’t seen anything to suggest a path to below.”

“Um,” Muca said, but was ignored.

“Maybe there’s a way down in one of these buildings,” Zak suggested.

“It doesn’t seem likely,” Ulraj said, gills flapping in agitation. “But I suppose we won’t know until we look around.”

“Uh,” Muca said, again. Again she was ignored.

“Well,” Zak said, “let’s split up, then.”

“I’m not going with the naga,” Ulraj said.

“Me neither,” Francis chimed in.

“Erm...”

“Fine,” Zak said, “I’ll go with - what is it, Muca?”

She’d finally resorted to tugging on his shirt, and, wordlessly, she pointed into the sky.

A giant, wormlike creature, with a mouth full of sharp teeth jutting out in every direction, and a single, bulbous glowing yellow eye, with a horizontal slit pupil, was staring down at them from between the spiral buildings. Thick, viscous drool leaked out of its maw.

The first head was joined by a second, and then a third. On their left came a fourth, and on their right, a fifth. Each one was drawing closer with a malicious curiousity gleaming in its eye, leaving great, big puddles of drool as their jaws worked open and shut, and their sharp, lance-like teeth rattled against each other.

Slowly, Zak reached for his claw, and Francis found his hand instinctually brushing against the warm wooden handle of Sharur.

“The demon,” Ulraj breathed next to him, pulling his fists close into a fighting stance.

Francis’s lips pressed into a thin line. Now he had a pretty good idea why there weren’t any _bodies_.

To their left, Zak and Muca were drawing back to back, Zak’s powers fizzling as he struggled to make a connection. “It’s not working, they - no, you shut up,” he growled, to seemingly no one. “Just let me - stop talking - “

The first head gave a wet gurgle, and lunged.

Immediately, everyone sprang into action. Ulraj moved lightning fast, dodging two of the worms at a time, with reflexes even Francis was envious of. It seemed like he must have had eyes on the back of his head, as he dodged every swipe at his blind spots with a practiced ease.

Francis couldn’t watch for long, however, as he was forced to parry an oncoming bite with the wooden handle of Sharur. For a moment he cursed himself for his idiocy - no way thousand-year-old wood could handle this kind of force - but it held firm in his hands - grew warm, even - and Francis thought, dumbly, that maybe this must be more of that hocus-pocus horseshit.

Still, the sheer strength of the monster drove him backward, shoes skidding against the stonework, until his back hit the wall of the bank. Francis narrowed his eyes as he worked through his options, until he remembered one of Sharur’s other horseshit abilities.

He let go of the spear, and the moment the creature’s jaws began to close around it, there was a sizzling zap and it recoiled with a gurgle of pain, dropping Sharur back into Francis’s hands. He smirked, clenching his hands around the wood that felt fire-hot.

None but him could wield it, after all.

Halfway across the square, Zak was struggling against one of the monsters that had come out the side alley, dodging and rolling, using his claw’s telescoping shaft for aerial mobility. He landed on the monster’s back, claw raised high, as he tried once again to get it to heed his call, fire flaring in his eyes, but it hesitated only a second before shaking him off. Cursing, he dragged himself back to his feet, and threw himself back in for another go.

Meanwhile, Muca was running and hiding. She’d been right: she was quite good at it.

Francis took a deep breath in to ground himself, as his own monster shook off the pain and turned back to glare at him. It almost seemed to be weighing its options, now that it knew it couldn’t simply charge him.

And Francis could swear it grinned.

It reached down and tore off a large chunk of the city center, wound its neck back, and threw. The chunk of stone shattered against the bank’s wall with a loud crash, shards of stone pelting off Francis’s back as he dodged. Little bits of gold and mother-of-pearl went skidding across the town square, the monster already working on dismantling another piece of architecture.

Ulraj had taken a moment to watch, and he and Francis shared an uneasy glance between them. Not only were these monsters big, they were smart. Scrambling to his feet, Francis ran to Ulraj, taking up a position at his back. As if they already knew to be wary of him, the heads Ulraj was fighting drew back.

“They’re soft and plushy,” Ulraj said to him, grimly. “Covered in slime, terrible to touch. Blunt blows won’t work. Can you cover me long enough for me to grab that javelin off the ground?”

“It’s probably going to break in one hit,” Francis said, moving into position nonetheless.

The monsters came rushing at them again, and Francis parried their blows, the blunt wood of Sharur’s handle redirecting the heads’ strikes, over and over. Sweat trickled down his brow, but Francis held his ground, slipping into a combat mode that analyzed every inch of his surroundings, began memorizing his opponents’ strategy of attack. While he was busy, Ulraj slipped away from his side, grabbing a fallen weapon from the ground and dashing into cover as another chunk of makeshift artillery exploded against the pavement.

The two monsters Francis was now engaged with were wearing him out, but he wasn’t losing his footing at all. The stutter at the start had come from being taken off his guard, but now that he’d had time to analyze his opponents, he found that they still weren’t that clever. Obviously, they weren’t used to their prey being as well-trained in combat as the gathered adventurers were, and bit by bit the fight became easier as Francis slipped into an easy rhythm. In fact - there! Taking advantage of an opening, the tip of Sharur slashed at one of the monsters’ throats, catching at the skin and ripping it open.

It recoiled in pain, gave Francis a moment to catch his breath, before he leapt in, finally on the offensive.

But he stopped halfway, as the heads pulled uncharacteristically backwards, and his instincts kicked in, flinging his body sideways just in time to dodge a giant chunk of wall hurtling towards him.

He looked over towards the creature that had thrown the debris at him. It gurgled at him in anger for dodging in time, drool flying off its jagged teeth. Behind it, there was a glint of light - off the obsidian tip of an Atlantean spear - Ulraj had climbed one of the skyscrapers next to the head, and was running towards where part of the building’s side had fallen off. Francis watched as Ulraj leapt from a building at its throat, the point of a javelin glinting in his hands. He watched Ulraj nail it on the side of its throat, the handle of the spear shattering with the impact, embedding the speartip in the roaring beast’s side. Ulraj fell to the ground, landing in a graceful roll, before he came running back to Francis’s side.

Between Ulraj’s strike and Francis’s injury, and the hit Zak managed to land directly on the eye of his monster, they seemed to decide, at the same time, that this was more trouble than it was worth. Retreating, the heads let out a thunderous roar all at the same time, and everyone had to cover their ears for the noise. Coordinated, the giant red worms went into a frenzy, bashing their heads into ground with all their strength, each slam resounding and echoing inside the pyramid, vibrations rattling their bones.

At first Francis didn’t know what to make of the behavior, until an ear-splitting crack rang in his ears, and a fissure began to spread across the pavement in the city square.

They were trying to bring the city down.

He ran. As fast as he could, he scrambled to make it towards the others, who had all realized the same thing. Every coordinated bash sent Francis flying up into the air, sent more and more cracks spiderwebbing across the ground. His footing became uneven, as the fissures became skewed planes, as the air filled with dust. His fingers just barely managed to brush against Ulraj’s still-slick gloves before the ground beneath him gave way to empty air, and he and the city were felled into the buried, hollow cavern below.

* * *

 

 

He was surprised to find all his limbs intact. Surprised to find his fingers still tightly curled around Sharur’s handle, its thrumming heat keeping him warm in the cold, dark cavern he was blinking into. Surprised that he was still alive.

Maybe less surprised to find Ulraj alive, as the kumari seemed to be made of tougher stuff.

“Are you alright?” Ulraj asked again, offering out a hand.

Wincing at the new bruises he could feel forming across his body, Francis pulled himself to his own feet, ignoring the king and brushing past.

Above them, about three stories up, was the hole they’d fallen from, a beacon of light. it illuminated the still-settling dust, the rubble of the Atlantean Wal-Mart.

“The monsters…?”

“Retreated, but perhaps not for long,” Ulraj said. “I think they collapsed the city to trap us down here while they go lick their wounds.”

A reasonable enough assessment.

“Where are Zak and Muca?” Francis asked.

“They fell further down,” Ulraj said. “They’re going to wait for us. Since the demon was so kind to open up a way to the bottom layer for us, we might as well take advantage.” He dropped the hand that Francis had ignored. “You know, any kumari would trade their air sac to get the king to offer them a hand up. You could be more grateful.”

Francis rolled his eyes. Birds of a feather flocked together, and Zak’s friend, king or not, must be just as annoying as the boy himself. It wasn’t worth his time or energy to acknowledge his jibes.

“Further down?” He asked, looking around.

Ulraj shrugged. “They fell to what they think is the bottom layer. According to them, there’s three layers counting this one. That’s what the naga says, anyways. The fall knocked Zak unconscious.” He snorted. “Likely story.”

Three layers...too many to simply rappel down, then.

“That thing that attacked us,” Francis said, following Ulraj as he picked through the debris, “what was it?”

“I don’t know. Do you have a light? It’s quite dark down here, and you don’t have shark senses.”

Scowling, Francis fiddled with his goggles until a flashlight turned on, illuminating the city that continued on underground.

“This is…” he said, momentarily hushed as he took in his surroundings. “A slum, isn’t it?”

If the surface was a densely packed urban jungle, then this was an ant hive tangled up in the roots. It even still smelled rotten, though everything that could rot had rotted away long ago. Musty, humid, and disgusting enough that he might have been nauseous if he was less well-trained.

“I know our scholars had said Challenger Deep was her own demise,” Ulraj shook his head, “but I never imagined this. These aren’t just a slum, they’re a veritable slave quarters. I can’t imagine anyone living here.”

Indeed, it looked like it could be just that. Floor to ceiling was stacked rooms on winding streets, small square windows. They looked like prison cells, cold and barren. The only reason they weren’t a fire hazard was because they were underwater and made out of stone. The lights - which, as best he could make out, were some kind of glowing slime mold - were few and far between, casting deep shadows into the tiny alleyways between blocks. The insides of the buildings were black and abandoned. Haunted.

“Your cities are different?” Francis asked, trying not to let it get to him.

“Much,” Ulraj said, grimly. His hands traced another etched graffiti, this one a long sentence in flowing script. “Oh, Kumari Kandam, a marvel of architecture! That’s what the humans used to write about us, back during our trading days. Though that was thousands of years ago.”

“Hm,” Francis said, not bothering to comment more.

The architecture told a sordid tale as they passed through the empty alleyways. Every now and again they’d run across some tiny crustacean or ugly little arthropod, which had all seemed to have adapted specifically to living in this ruin. Their oily little eyes glinted at them from the darkness, the only living residents of the once-overcrowded Challenger Deep.

When the living spaces got too cramped, the rich built up. They built up until they had nowhere else to go, and eventually even they, in their ivory, mother-of-pearl towers, which had been built - literally - on the backs of cramped, claustrophobic slums, came crumbling down.

“It’s what they get,” Ulraj said, breaking the silence after they’d been walking for a good half an hour. “Our gods passed down to us a set of laws for a reason. This was exactly what they were trying to avoid.”

“Do you really believe in that? ‘Gods’ and ‘old laws’?”

Ulraj shrugged. “To be honest, it doesn’t really matter what I believe. Whether it was because of divine providence, or because a council of elders thought I was best for the job, I am king either way.”

...That was a surprisingly pragmatic answer.

“Hey, look,” Ulraj said, running ahead. “There’s a great stairwell here. Looks like our way down.”

The next floor was the same as the first, for the most part, though the buildings seemed better-planned, more spacious. Almost even comfortable. The lights were beginning to grow a little brighter, too, though it was still too dim for Francis to put his torch away.

“Wait,” Francis said, suddenly. “You’re king. A council of elders picked you out?”

“Along with the help of my teachers, caretakers, and the current parliament, yes. Why?”

“I thought ‘king’ usually implied a hereditary position,” Francis said.

“Does it?” Ulraj asked. Francis almost thought he was joking, but he seemed serious.

“Wasn’t the old king your father?” That was what he’d read from the files his People had filched from the Secret Scientist databanks.

“Yes…?” Ulraj narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. “I’m beginning to think that word doesn’t mean what I think it means.”

“Your biological progenitor,” Francis said. “One of them, anyway.”

“I’d have no way of knowing,” Ulraj shrugged. “We all hatch from the same eggs. Our princes and princesses are chosen from the fingerlings based on merit. That’s how I know I’m the bravest, and noblest, and wisest in my age. Not to even mention how good-looking and charismatic I am.”

Francis rolled his eyes, and Ulraj laughed. “Well, I say that, but I was actually the second choice. Their first choice turned the position down.”

Francis raised an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”

“She wanted to pursue a career in art.”

He couldn’t help the little snort that escaped him, and Ulraj took it as a good sign, stretching his arms up and crossing them behind his head.

“That’s what I thought - who turns down a position like that? But I do think she made the right choice. I don’t think she’d have liked being king, but I do. The job comes with a lot of perks.”

“And a lot of free time, apparently.”

“Less than I’d have hoped, but yes. Quite cushy.”

It was...easy to talk to him, Francis found. As cocky and bullheaded as he’d seemed at first, over the course of their conversation, it’d become obvious those were just fronts he put on so he could tell jokes. Not that he wasn’t self-confident, of course, but as much as he liked to make light of his station, Francis thought that Ulraj seemed to be quite well-aware of the responsibility on his shoulders.

As they approached the center of town, the space seemed to widen up a little, and went from cramped, dense little apartments to spaces that actually seemed...habitable.

Ulraj had started talking about kumari culture, after he’d noticed Francis’s interest in the subject. He had a lot to say - everything from the structure of their government to the food delicacies, all with implicit invitations embedded in his words for Francis to visit someday. He talked about their religion, their creation myth, their end-of-days myth, the story of how their gods gifted them with wisdom, with the Old Laws, with the first city-serpents, long before humanity’s time.

Francis learned that kumari myth and religion was more a philosophy than a worship, and more a history than philosophy. All physical evidence of the old days had been washed away by the tides of the sea, but they had the city-serpents. Their scholars couldn’t explain why the great snakes had come to the kumari, why they seemed to share a bond with the race. That, for Ulraj, and for most of his people, was proof enough that there was some kind of kernel of truth in the myths of the past. Challenger Deep, he said, was proof that there was, more importantly, practicality in them.

“We’ve had philosophers, lawmakers writing on the Old Laws for centuries,” he said. “They’re worded kind of esoterically, but they basically boil down to keeping our society sustainable. My father once said…sustainability isn’t natural. It’s not in our nature, our drive as biological creatures.”

Perhaps not. But it was in their culture, embedded right down to its very heart. And the ruins of Challenger Deep proved that the Atlanteans had grown arrogant in their advances in technology, in architecture.

Like what Ulraj had said about being king, it didn’t matter if the cause for the civilization’s demise was unnatural or not - whether it was divine retribution for spurning the Old Laws, whether it was a demon that had been set loose upon them, or whether it was civil unrest and a broken infrastructure - either way, a once-proud city had been brought to ruin through no fault but its own.

They shuffled on.

“Francis, was it?” Ulraj asked, after a pause. “Zak’s told me much about you.”

“All good things, I imagine,” Francis deadpanned.

“Oh, no, mostly bad,” Ulraj admitted, freely. “But now that I’ve finally met you, I don’t think I dislike you. Though I can see where Zak is coming from. You and I are similar.”

“How do you figure?”

“Well,” Ulraj said, cheekily, but unlike his usual tone, he was measured this time. Calculating. “We’re both politicians, after all. Do you think I can’t recognize a scheming vizier when I see one?”

“That would be my father,” Francis said. “I’m still in training.”

“Haha. Yes, I thought as much. So we have common ground, after all.”

His shift in tone and posture had Francis standing up a little straighter. Ulraj was suddenly no longer “Zak’s friend,” he was the king apparent of Kumari Kandam.

“Then,” Francis said, “let’s talk politics.”

“Of course,” Ulraj answered, gracefully. “Why don’t you begin?”

The flashlight swept slowly from side to side as Francis composed his questions.

The truth was, though he’d been stubbornly ignoring it since Zak was involved, friendly relations with an undersea king could not be anything but useful. In fact, it would have been very shrewd of him to have approached Ulraj with geniality first. Respect, even. But the thought of Zak calling him out for being a suckup was nothing short of infuriating, so he’d instead given Ulraj the cold shoulder. The whole time Ulraj had been talking about his people, Francis had mentally been taking notes. Now he realized that Ulraj had specifically been talking about his people not because he’d thought Francis would find it interesting, but because he was initiating a cultural exchange.

He’d been appealing to Francis’s information-gathering nature because he had an ulterior motive.

Francis’s goggles glimmered in the dark.

“I’m afraid I’m not entirely sure about this situation,” he chose his words carefully. “I almost had the impression that this trip was a personal leisure. But it seems that was not the case.”

Ulraj merely listened, impassive.

“You represent the interests of Kumari Kandam, I assume,” Francis continued. “I have to admit, I’m curious what they are...and if Zak really is ‘just’ your friend.”

Ulraj hummed noncommittally, lacing his fingers behind his head. “The king of Kumari Kandam has three major duties, you see,” he began. “First, we are tiebreakers for the general assembly. Second, we are generals during war, and have the final say on declaring it. And third, we are our nation’s ambassador...and ultimately decide who we are allied with.”

He turned to face Francis and continued walking backwards, deftly avoiding obstacles in his path. That must be the shark sense he’d told Francis about, what had also been at play during their earlier scuffle with the monster. “Let me be clear: the kumari have not allied themselves with humanity. And I heard your conversation with the naga last night - neither, it seems, have you.”

Essentially, the king was asking Francis’s affiliation first, before he was willing to divulge a more comprehensive answer - how shrewd of him.

“My People serve their own self-interest,” he said, simply, “as any reasonable group would.”

“Yes, absolutely,” Ulraj said. “So you understand how we have nothing to gain from such a partnership. Humans just - “ he shrugged. “ - Don’t have anything to offer us.”

They were self-sustaining, after all. Anything they wanted, their engineers could make themselves.

“Now, don’t misread me,” the king continued, “Zak is a personal friend, first and foremost. The king has to remain impartial with matters concerning the state, so inter-kumari personal relationships are forbidden. Around Zak, I don’t have to be king. I can just be Ulraj. To be honest, I’d pretty much given up having any real friends for the rest of my career.”

Because Ulraj was, after all, still what Francis would call a “good person.” He liked Zak, and he would have come on this mission even if Zak wasn’t Kur, even if Zak had just invited him out for an adventure, not to stop a world-threatening calamity.

“Do you think Zak’s realized that you’re trying to win Kur’s favor for the good of your people?”

“No,” Ulraj said. “Frankly, I don’t think we could have been friends if he was the kind of person to consider that in the first place.”

“He’s an idiot,” Francis said.

“He’s honest. And since I live my whole life around shifty politicians, it’s a trait I’ve come to value.”

But honesty only got you as far as until someone betrayed it.

Ulraj just leered at him with an eyebrow raised. “You know, travelling with him might be less miserable if you think of him like that.”

Francis just scowled at the thought. Getting along with Zak, what a horrible idea.

“...If we fail,” Francis said, “and Kur returns, what will the kumari do?”

Ulraj was silent for a long time.

“...I suppose we’ll wait and see,” he said, a careful non-answer.

“If he targets the humans, and you know there is no way to save Zak’s consciousness. What will the kumari do then?”

“I think you said it yourself,” Ulraj finally acquiesced, a dull humor in his voice. “My people look after their own self-interest.”

“...Then why bother being friendly with me?”

“Because you’re Zak’s friend,” Ulraj said, “because I like you. But you won’t be satisfied with answers like that, I assume?”

How could he be? “I’m afraid not, your highness.”

“Then perhaps it’s because I think there’s as much benefit in a friendship with Kur as there is in a friendship with the ‘heir to humanity’.” He stopped, suddenly, and whipped around, crafty little smile on his face. “Perhaps I think you can see the sense in that.”

He extended his hand once more.

“So, what do you say, Francis?” He asked. “Friends?”

Hesitantly, Francis reached out to take it.

“Friends,” he said, narrowing his eyes.

Ulraj gave his hand a firm shake, chuckling. “You look like you’ve never had friends a day in your life.”

“I haven’t,” Francis answered.

“Tacitly untrue,” said the king, wiggling his fingers. “You made one just now. No backsies.”

 

* * *

 

“You know what it is that attacked us,” Zak said.

 _“I do._ ”

They were underwater this time, enormous multi-segmented creatures crawling through the seafloor sand, next to giant, swaying seaweed fronds that reached up towards the sun, dancing through the light.

The sea was always breathing. The Serpent sat cross-legged on a stone that jutted out from the water, its hair and jacket swaying in time with the currents that rocked the greenery back and forth. It, too, was facing the sun, watching the little rays of light that peeked through the waving strands of algae, how they mottled onto the ocean floor.

“But you won’t tell me?”

The Serpent laughed, derisive and ugly. “ _I am not silent. You wish not to hear._ ”

Its eyes glinted at him from beneath the shadow of its eyebrows, from beneath the shadow if its soul. They burned at him, they constricted around his throat, they seared his flesh and bone.

“ _Coward_ ,” it spat. “ _You are afraid of me_.”

Zak flinched, but returned the insult with a glare of his own.

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“ _Do not lie to me_ ,” it hissed. “ _Do not ever lie to me_.”

“You should be scared of me,” Zak said. “We’re going to get rid of you.”

“ _And you think that will be a_ _‘good’ thing?_ ” It leered at him, and the sea was cast in darkness. “ _Then you are a coward AND a fool. If you are so brave, then reach inside me and pull out your answers. But I warn you -_ “

And it grinned, a smile without any humor or warmth, the visage of the monster that could devour the world.

“ _\- If you throw yourself into my maw of your own accord, then I will not stop my jaw from snapping shut_.”

 

* * *

 

“I said _shove it_ , Furface. Get out of my way.”

Beeman’s nasally voice barked through the holding cells with all the authority a single man could carry. Drew muttered a curse under her breath as she stuck the piece of stone she’d been whittling into a prison shank beneath the makeshift mattress of cloth and moss she’d been given. As much as she didn’t want to see Beeman right now, she couldn’t go wasting her hard work on him. Beside her, Doc stirred, drawing himself up to a full sitting position, while Komodo clawed at the cage bars across from them.

Behind the curtain of vines separating this (admittedly cozy) prison from the rest of the intra-mountain paradise, lemurian grunting could be heard arguing with the Scientist, as he refused to let it get a word in edgewise. Finally, angrily, he stormed in past it, short the weapons usually holstered around his hip and the utility belt slung across his shoulders, the lemurian guard following while carrying them with concern.

Beeman turned to snap at it. “I said alone. _Como se dice ‘solo’?_ Yeah? Or are you as dumb as you look?”

The lemurian bristled, but grudgingly retreated, bowing out behind the curtain. Beeman made the “shoo” motion at it until it disappeared, its shadow back in its usual post at the cave entrance.

“What do you want, _Beeman?_ ” Doc asked. He’d have sounded venomous if he didn’t sound tired, the evidence of long nights spent pacing the cell trying to think of a way to escape. “Come to try and convince us we’re on the wrong side?”

“I don’t think you need _convincing_ of that,” Beeman said, sourly, pulling a small device out of his sock and planting it on the ground between him and the lemurian. Doc and Drew recognized it as he laid it into position and switched it on - a soundwave barrier. Immediately, the distant sounds of the goings-on of Mount Shasta grew almost nonexistent.

Whatever he’d come here to do, he’d come to do it in private.

“So, Doc.” He said, tucking his hands into his pockets as he turned to face them. “Drew. Been a while.”

“Yeah,” Drew said, cautiously. “Sure has.”

“How’re the kids?”

“Bastard - “

“Drew,” Doc said, putting a hand on her forearm. “It’s not worth it.”

Beeman smirked, but, like most of his expressions, it lasted for only an instant before it was wiped away by his usual glower. He took a few steps closer, so he was standing right in front of their cell, and crossed his arms.

“They lost him in the Pacific. If he sticks to populated areas or major waterways, they might not catch him for a while.” He glared down at them from behind his glasses. “You’re _welcome_.”

“He’s safe?”

“Don’t make me repeat myself.”

Method of delivery aside, this was the first real news Drew had gotten about Zak since they were separated, and the relief of it hit her like a sack of bricks. Doc, too - she could tell from the way his grip squeezed around her arm, the small escape of air from his lungs.

Zak was alive. Zak was free. They could work with this, definitely.

“Let’s not beat around the bush, then,” Doc said, leaning forward. “You wouldn’t have smuggled in a four-million-dollar piece of spy tech just so you could bring us good news. What are you here for?”

“Not much,” Beeman said, squatting down to eye level with them. “I have a few questions.”

“We have a few of our own,” Drew said.

“Nuh-uh,” the Scientist shot down. “We talk on my terms or not at all. I already gave you my _bona fides_ , so don’t get greedy.”

“Fine,” Doc said.

“Doc - “

“Something is better than nothing,” he reminded her, gently. “And I assume if we’re helpful we can expect more visits.”

“Maybe,” Beeman said. “You’re believing in me too easily. What if I was lying?”

Doc sighed. “If nothing else, Arthur...I’ve known you to be a man of integrity. Maybe not by my standard of integrity, but you wouldn’t tell such a blatant lie for something as frivolous as getting on our good side.”

“You’re right,” Arthur said, dully impressed. “I wouldn’t.”

“So ask,” Doc said. “Whatever these questions are. If they’re something we can answer…”

“Right,” Beeman said, lowering his gaze as he searched for the words.

Drew had never particularly liked Beeman. He and Doc went “way back,” according to him, but the first time she’d ever met the man was the incident that both landed him a spot with the Secret Scientists and very nearly a spot in the ICC. Since then, he’d been nothing but rude - not just to her, but to everyone he’d ever met. His brain was, to be sure, massive - incomparable, even amongst the other Scientists - but that had never given anyone license to go stomping all over everyone else. What made him especially distasteful, though, was that he _knew_ that, but acted the way he did _anyway._ She just couldn’t understand why someone would go out of their way to be such an...asshole.

Doc was better at dealing with him than anyone else in their organization - his patience was endless, and he seemed to have a particular fondness for the UFOlogist that extended beyond rationality. Of course, that fondness, and any other goodwill the two of them may have harbored for the man, had soured during the Kur incident all those years ago, when Beeman had been the first to take up the charge against their son.

She wouldn’t trust him farther than she could throw him. And she didn’t know why he’d taken a stance so counter to the other Scientists, who had all been swayed by the lemurians’ charisma, but it smelled like ulterior motives. Foul play.

“...If,” Beeman said at last, raising his gaze to stare directly into their eyes, “if that boy of yours turns out to be everything south of what we’re hoping, what will you do?”

“He’s not going to ‘turn into’ anything of the sort,” Doc said, with conviction. “He’s our son. He always has been. ”

“...Let me phrase that another way,” Beeman said. “If he’s the one - not me, not the fuzzballs, not the Scientists - if _he’s_ the one telling you to pull the trigger, what will you two do?”

Drew’s grip on her husband’s arm tightened. “What makes you think - “

“ _My terms_ ,” Beeman interrupted, “or not at _all_.”

“What she means is,” Doc said, “we don’t have enough information to make that call based only on that hypothetical. You understand when I put it like that, don’t you?”

“Don’t patronize me. Of course I do.”

They glared at each other for several seconds in unnatural silence, before Beeman let out a loud sigh, hunched forward, and rubbed the back of his neck, showing his fatigue.

“Doc,” he asked, “how long have we known each other?”

“Since college,” he answered.

“A little under twenty-seven years,” he corrected. “And in that time - in those _decades_ we’ve known each other - haven’t I only made _rational_ choices? Haven’t I only ever done the _most good_ , for the _most people_ , based on the cold, hard evidence on hand?”

He looked up at them with something foreign in his eyes, something raw and unshielded.

Drew wanted to say a million things, a million personal, private grievances, all boiling down to he’s only a kid, he’s my son, he’d never want to hurt anyone, but what would that achieve here? She looked to her husband, who was clearly thinking the same, his jaw clenched so hard a vein ticked in his temple, but he was always so much cooler under fire.

“...Yes,” he finally allowed. “That is the kind of person that you have always tried to be.”

Doc pulled himself close to the bars, resting his forehead against the cold steel.

“Arthur, what’s going on? It’s not like you to ask questions like that.”

The Scientist didn’t answer, only growled with frustration as he curled his head into his arms. Fingers grasping at his skull like claws, he dug into his scalp with his fingernails. He held himself in that position for a count of ten, before uncurling, exhaling, expression unreadable.

“I think,” he said, carefully, quietly, so quiet even Drew had to lean in to hear him, “...I think I’m making a mistake.”

And then, before the two could respond, he was back on his feet, stuffing the soundwave nullifier into his pocket, yelling at the guard to give him his stuff back as he stormed out beyond the vines, beyond where their voices could reach him.

 

 

* * *

 

Zak was awake by the time Francis and Ulraj were able to join them on the bottom layer, though he still seemed shaken by the fall, or something. He was nervous, and jumpy, and looked like he was about to explode, holding it in only because Francis and Muca were present. Above their heads yawned the hole they’d rappelled down from, light twinking down from above, and before them was the bottom layer of the city, beautiful, ancient, and abandoned.

The road ran downwards in a spiral pattern, before meeting the base of an enormous, curling colosseum that reached up to the ceiling in a conch-shell spiral. Across its glittering facade ran bands of the luminescent moss, in patterns of dolphin pods and fish schools, ocean currents and effigies.

It was the size of a football stadium, and was surrounded by pillars - later additions, ugly alabaster structures - that held up the roof of the cavern.

The buildings here were the most ramshackle yet, broken and crumbling. They’d clearly been looted for the gold and mother-of-pearl inlays that once decorated their walls, and then been forgotten about - indeed, even the temple was stripped bare down at floor level, the beautiful glimmering surface becoming matte and dull where it came into the reach of the average Atlantean. And then, like everything else in this most ancient of caves, it had been built over, and forgotten.

This was the city Atlantis lost.

Francis shifted the weight of Sharur on his shoulders. “Better get going, then.”

Their journey down the spiral slopes felt like a pilgrimage. Indeed, that was probably the reason the city was constructed this way.

Ulraj and Zak being together again, the two of them were running ahead to inspect the ruins, babbling excitedly about history and architecture and archeology, a myriad of subjects that Francis’s education glossed over. Even Muca was contributing to the conversations sometimes, slowly and grudgingly earning Ulraj’s acknowledgement.

She was still being kept at arm’s length, but the discussion had brought her over to his side in an argument with Zak. A heated debate that Francis didn’t think he’d have any place in, about history, or culture, or humanity. He was only straggling by a few feet, but the distance felt like an insurmountable chasm: his existence was too removed from theirs.

Ulraj looked back at him. “What do you think, Francis?”

“Not much,” Zak answered for him, and Ulraj elbowed him lightly.

“He’s right,” Francis said, catching up to them while they were stopped, waiting. “This sort of thing isn’t my forte. The snake is probably better conversation than me.”

“Sometimes an uninformed mind is a better judge,” Ulraj insisted. Francis’s doubt must have showed on his face, because Ulraj stepped forward to ask the question again. He seemed determined to hear Francis’s answer.

“Who would win in a fight? Kumari Kandam as she is now, or Challenger Deep in her prime?”

Francis gawked at him. He continued. “I say Kumari Kandam, but I’m biased. The naga takes my side, but Zak takes the stance that Challenger Deep would win. Since _apparently_ \- “ he looked at Zak “ - my opinion doesn’t count in this argument, we need a tiebreaker.”

“I…” Francis mumbled.

“Challenger Deep is a _classic_ fortified city,” Zak argued. “I’m betting that crystal pyramid can survive anything you throw at it, and it’s stupid easy to defend, if it’s only got like one entrance.”

“Easy to defend? Easy to starve out!” Muca rebutted. “The kumari have more resources. Even if Challenger Deep can repel her invaders, they have no way of bringing the fight to the kumari!”

“So you’re saying Challenger Deep can win against Kumari Kandam on their home turf?”

“O heir to humanity,” Muca said, clasping her hands together like a prayer, “please strike Kur’s terrible argument down.”

Ulraj was laughing and Zak was even smiling, unable to resist a good joke even if it was at his expense.

“It, uh, would definitely end up being a siege,” Francis allowed, uncomfortably. “But I wouldn’t have a good idea who’d be the winner without seeing some intel on each side’s weapons counts and rations - “

“Francis,” Zak groaned, but Ulraj interrupted.

“It’s not _really_ about who would win,” he said, “it’s about picking a side and sticking to it.”

“Oh,” Francis said, not seeing the point.

“Yes,” Ulraj continued, “so if you are unsure, then join our great kumari alliance! So magnanimous is our city, so noble and proud, we have even recruited a naga, defector to her kind!”

“I’m treasonous!”

Well, Francis supposed that that made up his mind for him.

“I think Challenger Deep would win.”

“Traitor!” Ulraj shouted.

“Humans are beings that know only cruelty,” Muca said, clutching her heart dramatically.

Zak eyed him suspiciously, but he couldn’t turn down the extra man on his side.

“The city is an architectural marvel,” Francis argued, “it’s a display of ingenuity. The siege would give them enough time to figure out a means of counterattack. Meanwhile, the kumari...aren’t they a little too conventional?”

“So it’s not only a battle you want,” Ulraj said, dramatically. “It’s the whole damn war!”

“War!” Muca cried. “Death to the humans!”

“To arms!” Zak yelled, jumping at Ulraj with his claw. But Ulraj saw the move and parried, brushing the claw aside and using Zak’s momentum against him to pin an arm behind his back.

“Our first prisoner,” Ulraj crowed. “Perhaps I should feed you to the nagas, to make an example of you?”

“I thought you two were sworn enemies!?” Zak asked, struggling to break free.

“Oh, we are,” Ulraj said, “but the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

“Don’t tell the kumari,” Muca stage whispered, “but we are planning to betray them as soon as we have annihilated the opposition.”

“Not if the kumari betray the naga first!” Ulraj cried. “Death to the humans!”

“Francis!” Zak yelled, dramatically reaching out to him. “You’re my only hope!”

“You’re doomed, then,” Francis said.

“Oh my god. You can’t play along for like, five seconds?”

“No, no, it’s not that,” Francis said. “It’s just that...well, my People don’t see the benefit, is all…”

Zak stared at him in disbelief for all of two seconds, before breaking into a grin.

“I’ll give you a coupon that shuts me up for an hour if you come help me.”

Immediately, Ulraj had to let Zak go in order to parry the flying kick Francis launched at him.

“Such a low price!” Ulraj said, in mock disbelief. “I can’t believe you were bought so easily.”

“And you,” Francis said, quickly discovering for himself how troublesome the kumari’s shark senses were in direct combat, “so quickly playing nice with your ‘sworn enemy’ just because Challenger Deep would have won, and you know it.”

Ulraj was agile, quick on his feet, and had no blind spots. What he’d meant only to be a halfhearted display of “camaraderie” had become a serious spar. The kumari king reminded him of the worst sessions he ever had with Epsilon, which inevitably ended with Francis acutely aware of how far he still had to go, while Epsilon could give nothing but a disappointed sigh, as he left the room, untouched.

It wasn’t really that Ulraj was as skilled or honed as Epsilon was, but his scary reflexes meant the blows landed few and far between. He barely looked like he was building a sweat.

In the sparring rooms it was always his loss. In one vein, it made sense that he could never win; Epsilon was simply the _culmination_ of “Francis,” the finished product. On the other, the impatience with his progress was always palpable. It made him wonder if he’d come out defective.

Epsilon was always in perfect form. Epsilons were always in perfect form. Efficient, brutal, and effortless. And Francis…

He...he _had_ to win this one. Whatever it took.

He left his flank open and Ulraj took the bait. The king’s fist against his ribs was painful even under his padding, but grimacing through the pain, he grabbed the kumari’s wrist and vaulted over his shoulders, pulling him into a chokehold with an arm pinned behind his back, slamming him into the nearest wall.

“I yield, I yield!” Ulraj surrendered, snapping Francis out of his reverie. Immediately Francis let go and stepped back several paces, the king falling to the floor, leaning against the wall for support.

He’d never meant to let it go this far. He was...he was swept up by the flow of things. How stupid -

“Francis, that was _awesome!”_ Zak shouted, clapping him excitedly on the upper arm. “I’ve never seen anyone take Ulraj down like that. I mean, besides my mom that one time. That was so cool! Teach me that move!”

“I, uh,” Francis muttered.

“And don’t think I didn’t recognize my strategy in there,” he said, something - pride? - swelling in his voice.

“I…”

He couldn’t stop staring at Ulraj, who was picking himself up off the ground, clutching at his shoulder. He waited for the words of condemnation or biting rejection, but none came. Instead, all he got was another playful tap on the shoulder, Ulraj grinning down at him.

“You sure don’t know how to hold back, huh?” He laughed, rolled his shoulder. “Next time, it’ll be my victory. Don’t think you can pull the same trick twice on the king of Kumari Kandam!”

He gave Francis a reassuring smile. No harm done. No grudge incurred.

Francis just crossed his arms. “You’re...not half bad...either.”

Zak gave him another pat on the arm. “Don’t push yourself, man.”

Francis glared.

It was with Muca’s entering the room behind them that they all took stock of the chamber they had stumbled into. Without meaning for it, and without noticing, they’d all stumbled into the temple’s antechamber, a small room with a doorway that lead off to their left, covered in glowing moss and deep indentations where gold and mother-of-pearl once decorated the walls. Huge sections of the wall had been crusted over by a white-colored mineral, and the stone was stained with chemical discoloration.

Zak put a hand up to it.

“It’s damp,” he said, surprised. Ulraj came closer to inspect it, while Muca’s ears twitched as she looked around.

“I can hear running water,” she noted.

“The huaca?” Francis asked, hand on Sharur’s handle.

Zak shook his head. “Not yet,” he said. “But it’s close. I can feel it.”

“How reliable,” Francis grumbled, but without any real venom. Honestly, at this point, whether or not Zak “felt like” it was close may as well be as trustworthy as a ground-penetrating radar.

“The whole floor here is made of stone anyway,” Ulraj pointed out. “Hardly anywhere to jam that spear. We might as well go deeper in...I can’t say I’m not excited to uncover what lies beyond.”

He turned toward the bas relief that had been etched into the wall. “This is our creation myth, from what I can tell. I expect we’ll see the others lined up in chronological order as we descend. The oldest parts of the kumari temples are only about four thousand years old - after the naga attacks, they ended up completely decimated. We had to rebuild them from the ground up.”

“Sorry,” Muca said.

“No, it’s not so bad,” he said, “the new ones are armed with cannons. Still, based on the writing...I’d say these are much older, by thousands of years.”

Despite himself, Francis could feel his heart beginning to race, just the slightest bit, at that revelation. On the surface, even he knew ruins seldom lasted even five thousand years, buffeted by the elements and by human intrusion, but here…

“Even I am having trouble reading this script,” Muca said, as they passed by more and more reliefs on their way down the slope.

“Oh? And here I thought you were supposed to be the translator,” Ulraj said, grinning.

“Well, I, it really - I only - can you read it?”

“Not really.”

“Ulraj,” Zak laughed. The king only flashed a cheeky grin.

As they delved deeper, through giant, yawning doorways, as the slope curled down, the walls became more and more well-preserved, untouched by greedy looters’ hands.

Eventually, even the humans could pick out the sound of running water, and sometimes it would drip down from above, leaking out of enormous aqueducts that leaned towards the center wall. The structure seemed to be built like an onion, in two layers; a circle wrapped around a giant middle chamber. And the whole time, it was descending, looping in dimly-lit circles toward the center of the earth.

Even though they’d started their descent with banter and teasing, as they walked downwards, ever downwards, the oppressive, sacred air of the temple hushed their voices. Fish-man kings from ancient times, holding artefacts of power, gazed down at them with eyes full of judgement and greed. Personified fish and cetaceans whipped the ocean tides into being, set the moon and sun into motion. Lines of succession were named and followed. Wars were played out, armies advancing on either side of the room.

The only ones speaking, eventually, were Ulraj and Muca, as Kumari Kandam’s king pointed out the myths he recognized, and Muca read for him what little she could make out.

The floor at the bottom was covered in a thin layer of water, maybe three-fourths a centimeter. The path split in two directions, opposite each other: a closed door that lead into the main chamber, which they had been circling around, and an open arch that lead to a darkened room.

Francis didn’t need the shiver that ran down Zak’s spine or the sudden warmth of Sharur on his back to deduce that the huaca lie beyond the closed doors, but they were made of heavy stone, crusted over with salt, and wouldn’t budge no matter how everyone pushed at them.

There was an inscription carved over the two sides of the door, badly marred by erosion and time. Muca clawed the salt off, translating as best she could.

“Take...erm...the blessing...across, maybe? ...This last part assuredly describes the door opening, but this part in the middle is either indecipherable gibberish or very lewd.”

“Across,” Zak repeated, peering into the open room opposite.

“Or we could return with explosives,” Francis groused.

“I wouldn’t,” Ulraj said. “I’m pretty sure the temple is helping to hold up the other three layers.”

Zak fumbled around his belt for his flashlight, but Francis stopped him as he was about to step inside.

“I’m rather new to this, but is it a good idea to just walk in? Aren't there usually...traps in old ruins like this?”

“Well, yeah,” Zak said, easily. He seemed to have forgotten all their earlier animosity; he was talking with the gentle, corrective voice his parents often used when describing what they were dealing with to the other Secret Scientists. “Tombs have tons of traps, since they’re all about keeping people out. But temples never do. I mean, you’re not exactly about to get donation money from your parishioners if the cathedral likes to kill off the guys with bad reflexes, right?”

“...Alright,” Francis agreed, letting go.

So a beam of light shot out into the darkened room, sweeping the walls from side-to-side. The room was circular, like everything else of Atlantean make, and across the wall ran a massive bas relief, thrown into dramatic black shadows and glimmering white highlights as the light caught off all its striking edges.

But perhaps more striking was the massive set of statues in the middle of the room.

There were times, when exploring ancient ruins, where a single discovery is enough to change an entire paradigm. These were the types of discoveries that would get people killed.

Doc and Drew had lived one - only one, fifteen years ago, when they had been excavating in Iraq and unearthed an ancient map that set a world catastrophe in motion.

And now, fifteen years later, Zak, Francis, and Ulraj were living their first.

“No,” Ulraj breathed, frozen in shock.

“Like it or not,” Francis said, quietly.

“I can’t accept this,” Ulraj repeated, stepping forward.

_“Dayaaluta was not a naga!”_

But the proof against his claim held her eyes peacefully shut, the water lapping at the base of her statue, rippling where two city-serpents came rising out of the sea, tamed by the ancient magics of the once-noble, once-pious naga race.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 13k words please kill me
> 
> LOOKS LIKE PLOT IS PICKING UP HUH
> 
> canon-typical violence and fantasy racism
> 
> LET ME KNOW ! WHAT YOU THINK ! FOR I HAVE SLAVED OVER THIS MONSTER FOR WEEKS !

**Author's Note:**

> [Footnotes.](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XCE2HVWziVGMvzQv8k5U5Ro1r3YFqIs4bFJcZew51Gc/edit?usp=sharing) I'll be going over all the animals, random trivia factoids, and obscure references to the original show's continuity (sure, maybe _i_ obsess over every little detail of the show and know practically everything about it, but I'm not expecting you guys to), so be sure to check them out!


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